She couldn't breathe.

His voice was seductive, almost, one he rarely used, if ever. She was aware that he was still capable of tricking her into doing something foolish. That was his nature. He was a child. And children loved to play games, but with him right there in front of her, she couldn't find a reason to resist.

Without thinking, she raised her chin up so that her lips hovered on the corner of his chin. She wanted to know that he trusted her and knew that she wouldn't betray him. Only the running water from the fountain outside the open windows flowed through the calm air, and his breath, still smelling of sweet mint, was noticed by her. "Why can't you just trust me, Alois?" Her fingers coiled stiffly around the opening of his purple jacket.

Pleased with her compliance he made no effort to shake of the clasp of her hand, seeing nothing of it than an eager action he basked in the reaction she so lavishly responded to him with prevalence of her uneasy and bothered, yet somewhat carnal visage.

The closeness of her, the touch of her mouth that almost graced his own was just encouragement. She was giving him exactly what he wanted, and he was loving it. The smug boy just got more cocky with his little toy, drawing up a pale hand to caress her chin with a finger and a thumb with little grip; pinching her chin and manipulating her stance to his content.

Making no effort to alter the amorous husk to his tone, his narrowed gaze turned heavy. "You're just going to have to prove yourself..."

He wasn't just about to kiss her. He was far too superior, or at least how he preferred to think of himself, to make any effort now. He was only going to be happy when she succumbed...when he felt nothing but adoration from his little victim.

Elizabeth was aware, from the mere tone of his voice that he was just messing with her and it disgusted her. She lowered her face and backed away from him. "I'm not your toy, Alois." Her eyes grew darker, her face serious and hurt by his manipulation. "You may think that playing with people will get them to like you," she paused at those words, "but it won't work. For someone to actually hold you with passion and legitimacy, you have to show them that you have the capability of doing it to them." She grew slightly frustrated. "For weeks now, I have been by your side, learning about you, your life, your home, your family, and I have loved every second of it. Getting to know you was the best thing I could ask for, but I can see that you're still, even after all of this time using me." She was on the verge of tears and she clasped her hands together. Her curls dangled at the sides of her face. "I care about you, Alois, but I need to know if you care about me too, or else, I can't stay here anymore."

The feature of taunting smirks and dissolute play quickly fell from him, turning into that of a miserable pout, an empty glare, bored as she spoke with a cross of his arms. He had failed and she was annoying him and she had yet to understand that their relationship was very much on his terms.

A small growl of frustration resonated in his throat and his hands locked around the fabric of his sleeves. He stepped towards her and dipped his head to regain her eye level, not quite to the same closeness as before, and he parted his lips to say something snide but hesitated, closing his mouth and lingering, all to close his eyes and let out a breath that flooded from his nose. He didn't want to lose his company. He didn't want to be without her. And though her threat could have been empty to him, she reminded him of Luka. And he had grown fond of her. He had felt the need of her. So he remained silent and retracted from the protective posture he made of himself and stared off to his side with the sounds of her insecurity, feeling nothing short of guilt.

Tears stroked down her cheeks. She didn't want to leave. Deep down she enjoyed being with him. She had grown highly attached to him. He wasn't just a replacement for Ciel. She wanted to be in this boy's life. "Well?" She sighed. The water streaking her face now ran onto her gloves that rested on her flushed cheeks. Her heart was beating fast in terror of being rejected and her breathing grew heavier.

He moved not from his stance of shame. His was body still with just the rise and fall of his chest. He wasn't happy one bit with this outcome and he didn't mean for her to become so hostile. She wasn't anyone he was exactly used to; being able to have his maid at complete humiliation at his own expense. So why was he feeling guilty? Was it just the sheer reminisce he felt of her and the uncanny wit of his beloved brother? "Bloody 'ell..." He grumbled, the twinge of self-resentment in his stomach. "I only wanted to have tea with you." With a flex of his jaw he clamped his teeth, letting his gaze fall upon the wreck of a woman he had created. Lifting a curled finger, he pressed it to her cheek, capturing a tear. "I do care... I just don't know what to do about it." And then fear. He scared himself after uttering those words. Because they were truer than what he wanted to accept. "I want you, Elizabeth."

Her eyes were still releasing streams. She held her face in her hands and released every emotion she could. "I can't.. lose you too." Broken words of a broken heart. The memories of Ciel flooded through her brain. They were scattered memories and flashes and shaky whispers of his voice.

"Elizabeth!" He stuttered, and wrapped his hands around her wrists, retracting her hands that coiled around the twisted face of a bawling girl. A shaking woman in absolute pain, maybe, but Alois just couldn't handle this. He shook her softly and angled himself to capture her attention. "I'm sorry!"

She nearly knocked him over as she embraced him.

With a stiffened body in absolute shock his arms soon began to move into place around her back, swooning her into him, locking them together firmly. He loosened his grip with the violent shudders of her shoulders as she sobbed. With a tighter grip, he dispelled the bunches of material that collected beneath his arms at her back, clasping onto her in complete remorse.

She clung to him like he was her last lifeline and she prayed he wouldn't let go.

He remained silent, hugging her over her shoulders. There wasn't much he could do. So he stayed still, the same look of chagrin.

As the boy's arms still rested alongside her, she began to fix herself and creeped along the front of his now damp attire. She sniffled lightly at her movement change and made her way up to Alois' face where she sat there staring at him. Her green eyes looked like Christmas, puffy and swollen, still wet from the salty tears. She had grown attached to him.

She twirled his fringy bangs between her small hands and rested them behind his ear. They stood there in silence embracing each other. She cleared her throat slightly to regain her posture and took his arm with her. She stared into the corner of the room where his butler now stood. Claude Faustus, was his name according to Alois. He was strange, silent, and dark but also a man Elizabeth had become used to seeing at the manor.

Moving slightly to observe her expression, the hand that held her to his torso retracted down to her neck, a curled finger dusting over the placid white flesh of his companion in attempt to comfort her further. He didn't want her crying.

She looked up at Alois, noticing that he was already staring down at her with something in his eye. Concern? She pulled him by his arm over to the open window overlooking the fountain and front yard. They could hear the birds singing, the water running, the bugs chirping and the sweet, calm breeze that smelled of autumn. "Look, Alois. Look around you." She smiled, staring off into the distance. She continued pulling him to the door that led directly outside. They stood on the large stone steps, dozens of feet off the ground. She released his hand and took a deep breath. Her curls flounced back gently from the wind and her dress rustled next to it.

"I suppose it is all rather beautiful," He mumbled, succumbing to her serenity. The grounds he owned ceased to impress him after a good year of living among it. But now, after such a strange day, as the setting sun tainted the sky a warm amber and the thin clouds of autumn glowed a neon pink and the scent of firewood in the air, she had brought understanding to him that evening through her own bawls at his expense. Now she was placing her trust in him; sharing a moment of contentment. "But I suppose," he sighed, shedding his damp coat and folding it over an arm. "I suppose you suit this; this kind of beauty."

She continued to stare out at the ripening sky. She blushed, though the pink glow from the setting sun hid it. "Why me?" She whispered through her slightly parted lips. Alois had chosen to keep her as a companion and it confused her. She wanted to know what made her different. She started to slowly walk down the steps to a cobblestone pathway leading to the separate rose garden. The clicking of her shoes seemed to be washed out by the evening noise; horses clopping by, and wheels turning on the dirt road in the front of the manor. They were distant but easily heard. She was hoping the Earl would follow her, but when she turned around, he still stood on the steps.

Lost in thought he stood, staring off at the distant girl that began a slow decent down the path. He didn't really want to tell her that it was out of luck. He didn't want to tell her his love was free to anyone who could offer their affection to him; to acknowledge him. He didn't want to say 'Because you entertain me,' or 'I don't know'. He couldn't give her such a bland answer. He wasn't as confident in himself that she would stay with him if he were to tell, an he doubted she could understand when he would say 'But I do care now. I do feel the same. I want you.' He couldn't. He just couldn't. So he stared. And the face of compassion and warmth for the girl soon morphed into a slate of emptiness. Emotion a chore; emotionally worn.

He didn't know what to tell her.

"Alois?" She repeated his name, but after waiting for several more moments for a reply that never came, she turned around and continued down the path. She wished he would answer.

Elizabeth was a being of emotion. She was happy and excited and when she became upset, her face turned into Niagara Falls. At that moment, however, watching his emotionless face, she felt nothing. She didn't feel overjoyed and happy, but she didn't feel remorseful either. It was just a state of being.

Silence was one thing that made situations awkward between them. Elizabeth was always used to keeping a conversation with someone, full of laughter and whimsical stories, and her and the Earl had had many of those times, but when neither of them spoke, a tension grew. It wasn't an atmosphere of anger; it was of sheer awkwardness, obliviousness and naivety for both of them.

He didn't like this. No ounce of his soul could ever belong in comfort to this-whatever it was, but he couldn't just allow it to continue, nor could he conjure up an apt explanation. And it nerved him, how apathetic she was. How not "Lizzy-like" she was.

With a steady step and a wary look to his eyes he stalked in on her, silence ensnaring them with merciless disdain.

Though his lips had parted and his breath flowed freely a sound that should have been words was but a stutter, a noise of hesitation and nerve.

"Elizabeth... Let's go to bed," He finally uttered, hoping she would understand his surrender.

His proposal wasn't something innocent. It wasn't asking her to sip tea with him. Even so; it was completely empty of anything that could have been lust. He wanted to lay with her. He wanted to sleep with her. He wanted to be close. But he didn't want to corrupt her.

Not like that old man.

She was surprised to hear his voice over her shoulder as her crouched body extended a hand to a blue rose that had wilted over slightly. The words, however, that came from him were ones that made her body freeze. Let's go to bed.

She slowly turned her small body, standing up as her feet twisted in the grass. Her eyes were calm and her eyebrows were less than narrow with her mouth sealed shut. What she saw when she looked up was a boy who had a care in the world. And for once, she realized it was her.

Her lips touched and then parted, beginning again, hoping words would actually fall from them. "What did you just say?" Her tone wasn't harsh, just confused.

He felt something quite recognizable. It was the feeling of being disregarded; the feeling of hopeless desire. He was hurt, and exactly what he didn't want to happen was happening. She was an empty husk and once again the boy had found himself loving and being unloved.

And it was all because he couldn't just say it.

He knew that from her question she had taken him wrongly and he was now realizing himself what he had just said.

"Stop that..." He murmured, and hastily walked towards her, distracting himself from answering. She was picking a dying rose, and it wasn't exactly of that world; it was blue. Blue roses did not exist in that world. "The thorns," taking her hand into his, he uncurled her fingers from the threatening stalk, surprised she hadn't yet managed to cut herself.

Disregarding the alien rose - something that once upon a time would have held his attention fully - he kept a hold of her hand.

"Just... Sleep with me."

Her hand remained cupped in his gentle grasp. She wanted to believe she was misunderstanding what he was saying, but she was unsure. Did he mean sleep with her…or…something else? Something more natural?

She held his gaze with her eyes flooded with innocence. She was not a girl that went with anyone, but she didn't know his romantic life, never mind that. She hoped that he was just playing, though it wasn't exactly a funny game. The fact that she misunderstood him never registered in her brain. She had a very one tract mind, and once an idea was in her head, it wouldn't leave unless directly acknowledged by the reason it was there in the first place. In this case, it was Alois.

"I don't think I can do that, Alois...I'm not like that." She replied quietly, still holding his hand.

The solemn glance twisted into frustration. It was just slight, ever so slight, but it was there.

The Earl tightened his grip around her hand in slight panic.

He was losing her.

And he could feel his patience

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The hands that clasped at hers jolted forward, dragging her into arms that flicked out in desperation, swarming her to him in a firm grip.

"If we go to bed we can wake up happy!" He cried in a bogus idealism. "Why? Why can't you just do that for me? You promised you wouldn't leave!" His words soon turned into screams.

Elizabeth had made a very bad decision.

She had given herself to the unloved.

"Alois!" He was suffocating her by his violent embrace. She tried to yell, but her voice was muffled beneath his clothing that stuck to her.

She finally understood. He wanted her, but not in the way she had originally assumed. Idiot she thought herself. I'm such an idiot, but his screams terrified her. She was afraid to say something; she couldn't say anything anyway. She could hardly breathe.

She didn't mean to hurt him, she just hadn't understood what he meant. "A-.." she started to say. The tightness of her corset alone was enough to cause her lungs to cave in slightly. Even as a girl, her mother taught her how to dress like a lady and that meant a thin waist...even if it meant lack of oxygen. His arms were doubled over her like a second...a third…corset.

She struggled to escape his embrace, but the more she tried to move, the tighter his limbs came together around her. The clamps of his arms just continued to press against her until he heard her yelp.

He was hurting her.

Dropping her ever so suddenly, he scrammed away from the breathless girl, a tortured look of concern and frustration.

Why... must I hurt everything? Why must everyone I care for die or... show me nothing? Why do animals run from me at first glance? And why can't people just do as they're damn told?

"Fine!" He yelled at her with distress. "Just leave! See if I care!" With this he turned sharply. And for once he was adornment.

He'd be the one running away.

Her hands held her chest. Elizabeth's lungs were aching. She breathed slowly in and out trying to catch her breath, tears quietly lining her bottom lid.

"A-Alois, please!" She choked. Her breathless voice desperately cried out to him. She didn't want him to leave. That's not what she wanted. Her vision blurred seeing only the back of the young Earl's purple coat. And as she sank, she felt her cheek hit the cold ground beneath her.