Hello! I'm back! I just spent the last 2 months doing hard labour at at Girl Scout camp. yay. So anyway, this was SO much fun to write, since I haven't written anything in a while. I hope you enjoy!
This chapter is dedicated to Eve Is A Slave To Life, for her review. I really loved it, it made me laugh!
Many years passed, and now Nicholas was twenty years old. Skye felt that he was ready to start his plan. He created one nemesis after another for the Young Master, and Nicholas gladly ran around like a chicken without a head attempting to kill them. But they were nothing, just some insignificant mortals that Sebastian had bent to his will. Of course, Nicholas was nothing like his father. His father would have quickly dispatched these small players, always keeping his eye on the big game. But Nicholas was stupid, and always thought the small-fry he was chasing at the moment was the big one. Ciel had been so much fun to work for. He had always kept an eye on Sebastian, on his enemies, and on his friends, waiting for one to make a move, ready to kill them if need be. Nicholas, on the other hand, hated Sebastian, but did not keep a close eye on him, assuming that he only worked for his owner's best interests. He had no eye for the bigger picture when he fought his enemies, and he had no friends. Ciel would pretend to be friends with some advantageous players, and manipulate them as the need arouse. But Nicholas had no friends. No one liked him. Except his sister.
Evelynne was a beautiful young girl now, seven years old. She had golden hair that shone brightly in the light. Her eyes large, doe-like eyes were a dark blue, like her father's. She was small and fragile, and Nicholas, despite his all-encompassing hatred, loved her. He wanted her to live a good long life, outside all the English underground. When ever he was with her, he felt ashamed of all he had done, all that he felt, because she, she was an angel, and he did not deserve her presence.
But, of course, Evelynne was not a little angel. She was more like her father than Nicholas was. She, with only a few years under her belt, knew more about the world than Nicholas, with his twenty years of experience. She knew Skye for what he was. A demon. A demon who was going to torture her poor, stupid brother, until he eventually ate his soul. She, despite all her protests to her only friends, felt a small bond, but a bond none the less, to her brother. He had taken care of her for all the time she'd been alive. He fed her, he clothed her, and he bought her anything she wanted. He was the perfect brother. Her relationship with Nicholas was very much like her father's relationship with their great aunt, Madame Red. Ciel could manipulate her, and use her, and condemn her, but he could not kill her.
Even though Nicholas was too dense to keep an eye on Skye, Evelynne did. She watched him constantly, and when the need arouse, she pretended to want to play with him, to keep him out of his little schemes that she knew he was creating for her brother. She would sit and absorb every bit of information she could. She would sit beside Nicholas in his study and quietly play with her dolls, not saying a word. If he got up to go to the bathroom or stretch his legs, she would, quick as lightning, run over to his desk, and riffle through his papers, then quickly put them all back the way they had been before, and just as Nicholas would return, she'd be back on the floor, putting a different dress on her doll. When Skye or Nicholas would throw her out of the room to talk "grown-up business," Evelynne would plop down right outside the door, and listen, always getting everything she needed to keep tabs on them. When they would go to the door, she'd be sitting in the hallway, having a tea party with little china cups filled with air. Nicholas was none the wiser of the intelligence of his sister. He knew she was smart for her age, and he thought the world of her, but he still thought her ignorant of his dealings with the underground. Skye was suspicious of Evelynne, but she was too quick for him, and he never really got any proof of his suspicions. He would try little things, testing her knowledge, setting intelligent traps for her, but she always seemed to be one step ahead of him. And Nicholas did not enjoy finding Skye with his precious baby sister, and always ordered him away from her.
Nicholas was just a nuisance to both his sister and his butler, both with their plans that used him to get something bigger, something that Nicholas just couldn't see. Nicholas was after some unknown. He wanted those that killed his mother to die. But no one directly killed her. So Skye sent him off to kill those that tied her to the stake, then on to the police that held her in prison, then those that orchestrated and organized the burning. And soon most people involved had been killed. Now they were after the nobles, and soon Skye would send Nicholas to kill the queen, the woman that Ciel respected most out of all the people he had known. Then Skye's real plan would begin. Skye, of course was after Nicholas's soul. He would torture Nicholas as much as he could, then take him down to Purgatory where he would parade him around in front of Ciel before devouring him. Then Skye would tell Ciel of all the wonderfully nasty things that Skye had done to his family. Then the ex-Earl, filled with despair, would have his soul eaten by the one person he had thought he could trust in his life, and knew would betray him in death. It was a perfect plan, and just thinking of it filled Skye with delight and made his daily life serving his new Young Master bearable.
Evelynne, on the other hand, was out to prevent Skye from destroying her brother. But not out of compassion for him. She knew that it would be hard to exist on her own in England. She would be expected to marry, and a husband would get in the way of her future plans. If she did not marry, then her goals would be harder to reach, due to the gossip that would undoubtedly run wild throughout England about her. All the women would keep close tabs on her, on the look-out for any bit of gossip they could use, and it would be almost impossible for her to make a move. And, at the moment, she was merely a child, and she would have to live with a relative. There was no way of getting around that. She could not exist in this present age alone. As much as she hated to admit it, she needed Nicholas. And so, without compassion, she would protect him from that enemy that he could not see.