Ciel wakes up, disorientation clouding his mind. Haziness can be seen in his hooded eyes as he rubs the sleep away.
"Ah, you're finally awake. I do hope you're over your little temper tantrum from yesterday."
Suddenly, the young boy's grogginess disappears "You..."
"Calm down, little lord. There's nothing to worry about"
"Of course there is!" he shouts indignantly.
She scoffs "Stop stressing. You won't get anywhere in life if you continue with such a bad attitude."
"You..." his nostrils flare "I do no-"
"Ah-ah" Sienna waves a finger in his face "No talking back, mister. You will be starting your training today."
"T-training?"
"Yes." she confirms "Training" He groans. Just what was she gonna make him do? "Now, up and at'em. There's no rest for the wicked, little lord. And if you're anything like me, you're definitely wicked. Wicked enough to earn my love!"
His face pales. She's already that attached? It's only been a few weeks since she arrived... "Hnm..."
"You're like a little brother to me. Much better than my actual brother, Little lord" The woman smiles sweetly. "Now come on, slowpoke." Sienna moves away from him, her nose scrunched in distaste "Brush your teeth, dog breath."
"Move your fingers...No, the ones on your other hand...Do you want to chop them off? If so, just keep doing what you're doing. Go ahead. Continue, please."
Ciel sighs "What am I doing wrong?"
"Everything!" she exclaims "Just look at you!"
"Well, I'm not exactly the best cook. This is below my position, so I have no reason to go through this"
"Of course you do" Sienna says in a 'duh' tone "I said so! Now, come on. I can't be the only one that knows how to cook modern food in the house...er...ship. Besides, your wife will definitely appreciate a man who can cook!" she pinches his steadily reddening cheeks.
She can barely resist the urge to 'boop' his nose. Eh, why not?
"Hey! Stop that!"
Sienna giggles. "Oh, come on, you know you don't mind. I mean, who could ever dislike being in my presence. You're lucky I'm even gracing you with it"
"Young master," Sebastian interrupts "pardon me, but it is time for your piano lessons..."
"No way Jo-se! Not on my watch! He will be cooking. To hell with those. What use do those serve? None. And anyways, he can always practice later, but right now is for cooking."
"That is not necessary, for he has me to serve and cook for him. It is expected of him to be knowledgeable about such a classical instrument. His parents would turn in their grave if they knew of he-"
"Enough." Ciel orders "That is enough about my predecessors. There shall be no more mentioning of their names. And Sebastian...you have no right to utter such nonsense. You'd never lie to me, was it?"
"He's a demon, Ciel. He can't help it, ya know? They don't really have much else to live for, so they turn to-" grunts of shock come from the Seraph.
"You may not say such thing about my kind. You are one of us, after all." Sebastian hisses, his eyes narrowing, and his pupils thinning into slits.
"Oooh, touchy, touchy." she ignores the last part "I see I've hit a soft spot. What is it, an old lover? Did she die-or, no,- suicide?" boisterous laughter follows " I'm going to break into hysterics if she turns out to be a reaper."
"You li-"
"I said 'enough', Sebastian." The young man says softly "And you, Sienna...stop provoking the demon."
"Yeah, yeah, little lord, I know: no killing the filthy monster."
Sebastian hisses "Pardon me?"
"No way, bitch. You're stuck with me and all of your choices...including the formation of a contract WITH A TEN YEAR OLD!"
Ciel seems to come to a conclusion, as he straightens and his eyes narrow "I'm sick of your arguments with each other. From now on, both of you will be completing your chores together."
Her defiant cries are left unheeded "Chores!? I don't have any chores! I refuse to do anything with him! I don't want to!"
"Your chores are the same as his. In addition, you will have chores of your own. I will provide you with the list within an hour" Ciel walks away
"But what about the cooking lessons!? You're an absolutely horrid chef!"
Sienna's grumbles were not completely ignored, for Ciel had shouted his displeasure with her ruckus several times.
Her current task was to wash the dishes, which were stacked up to the ceiling. How that many were used in such a short period of time was unknown to her. The pots clanked against each other as she scrubbed aggressively, pausing only when Sienna stopped to focus on the scoldings of a certain young earl.
A mere hour later, Sienna completed her task. "Done! Finally, I'm free!"
Sebastian tsks, appearing out of nowhere, pulling a crumple-free list out of his pocket "Not so fast. You have several remaining duties you need to fulfill. Those include washing the linens and scrubbing the deck...in that order, it specifies."
She groans "Well...off I go, then." Sienna stumbles away, stomping her feet just to annoy the Young Master.
"Pick up your feet! Or are you so pathetic you cannot summon the strength to-?"His ears ring, and his cheek starts to burn. Did she just...?
Sienna looks pretty satisfied with her effect on him. Well, her slap's effect, at least. "That is not the case, Demon."
"Demon? Oh, so you are so attached to me that you cannot bear to use my given name?" mutters Sebastian "Weakling."
"Excuse me!? I do not like your tone, mister!" the woman took on a mocking motherly tone. "You will show respect to your elders, and that is final!"
His eyes narrow. Sebastian takes one large step toward her, towering over the Seraph. "You're enjoying this, aren't you? My, my, you're so bossy...I like it" The demon takes a loose strand of hair near her face, holding it delicately between his index finger and thumb.
"I'm not in the mood." Sienna simultaneously slaps his hand away and pushes him back "Get away from me, or I will shout at the top of my lungs about your cooties. No girl would ever want a guy with cooties...ugh, I dated a guy in 4th grade, and he didn't tell me he had cooties."
His expression was beyond horrified "...cooties? No...not cooties"
"Yes...cooties." she whispers threateningly "...you don't even know what cooties are, do you?"
"Not a clue."
Sienna holds her head high "Of course you wouldn't. No one of your status would ever have the privilege of possessing such knowledge."
"I will have you know I am-"
"Ah!" She makes a 'zip it' motion with her hand. "I don't want to hear it. Go to your room!"
"Back to that again, I see."
"Well, duh; it's entertaining."
"You two..." Ciel takes a threatening step out of his study. I hadn't realized that we were moving down the hall as we threw insults at each other. "Quiet down already! Sebastian, this is an order: make friends with Sienna. I don't care what you do, but I don't want to hear any more from you two! Got it?!"
"Ooooh, you're all flustered. Come on, little lord, that's not necessary. Its all in good fun...Right, Sebby?"
The demon in question smiles sinisterly "Yes... merely friendly bickering"
"Yes. My threats are simply empty, although I do often have the sudden urge to give you a high five...granted, it may be violent... and on your face, but at least I'm giving you a reward for all your work."
"Where did you steal that from? It is not possible for someone with your intellect to comprehend such daedalion words."
"Dandelion? Isn't that those flowers you blow to make a wish?" she reminisces "Ah, the good 'ole days. Way back when that was popular. That's, like, 130 years in the future. Or, wait, 120, maybe? Let's see...16+100= 116 100-89=11+116=126. So, I guess If you rounded it'd be 130 years...unless you rounded to the nearest year, in which case it would be 125, as it would be about may right now. Wait, was it a leap year? I think it was, so it would be a day or two later in the year, then. Dang it, what am I saying? It's May for sure." She rants. At their blank looks, she leans into the broom Sebastian holds as if talking into a microphone, "That is my final answer."
"Yes...of course. Now that that little spew of yours is over," The demon shoves the broom into her hand "Go do your chores." he turns to Ciel "I apologize, Young Master. Would you like some tea?"
"Yes, actually, I would."
"Earl grey, I assume?"
The study door slams shut behind Ciel. Sebastian continues to the kitchen to prepare his young master a beverage.
Her voice echoes in the silence "But what am I supposed to do with the broom? I don't need a broom for my chores."
"I've finished my chores, little lord. Now what?" Sienna collapses on the couch. She snuggles into a nearby pillow, hugging it to her chest.
"I suppose you may be excused for now. Do whatever you would like that does not bother me, nor severely damage this ship" he says in a warning tone. The shuffle of papers follow.
She makes a whining noise in the back of her throat "But that's so boring! There's nothing fun to do here. This trip is taking so long!"
"Yes, but we can't help that"
The woman brightens."Yes we can! I can get us there faster!"
"Absolutely not." he says firmly "I forbid you from using any magic to transport us."
"It's not magic!" she insists "It's just...a little extra power I borrowed from the guys upstairs.
"So...what you are telling me is that you stole your power?"
"Not exactly...I just...didn't tell them I was using this power. I'm perfectly allowed to do it, but I didn't want to fill out all the paperwork saying I wouldn't go on a rampage or turn against them."
Ciel raises an eyebrow, humming "Hmmm...that is...interesting, to say the least." He was surprised she willingly gave up such vital information.
"Oh, nu-uh! You will not use this against me. I told you this out of the kindness of my own heart! You can't turn that against me!"
"I wasn't planning on it."
"Yeah...right" her doubt is clear.
Word Count: 1,853
I am SO sorry it took me so long to update. I really am. I sort of lost interest in this story, but do not worry! I will not give up on it, nor will I just give half my effort. I will continue updating (hopefully) quality work, but it may be less frequent. After about two weeks or so school will be over, so I can update more often. For now, I'm sorry.
I also want to throw in that I'm learning Japanese. I probably should have waited 'till school was over, but I just couldn't bear waiting. I have been learning Spanish for seven years now. I started learning Japanese less than a week ago (on about Sunday, May 15, 2016). For those of you who don't know, Japanese has two 'alphabets', you could say. Each 'letter' has it's own sound. There's katakana and hiragana. I'm learning hiragana. I've only learned 20 characters of the 46 hiragana, but I think I can learn 7-8 more this weekend. As far as I've researched, I should be done learning all of them in about a week, but I don't know if I can keep up with that. I tried to organize it like that, but it didn't turn out so well, so now I'm working at a pace I feel comfortable with. I don't think I ever realized before how many internet resources there are to learn a new language. Here are just a few:
lang-8
memrise
japaneseclass . jp
guidetojapanese . org
Quizlet
Some of you may be familiar with the last one, because it is often used in schools to help students study. Lang-8 is more for helping you with grammar of a language you've already studied for a while.