"I sure like cookin' for you demon, I get to test out recipes that I never could for humans." Marie chuckles jovially as she hands me a plate.
I cast my eyes over it and start to salivate at the sight of the perfectly molded sponge with a thick caramel colored sauce that drips down from the sides on to the plate, creating a sweet and sumptuous moat.
"What is this? It smells familiar." I wonder as I bring it to my nose for a little sniff.
"It's Sticky Toffee Pudding, I remember you sayin' that it was a favorite of yours, non?" She sits down on the black chair in front of me as I try to stifle my absolute joy over the prospect of tasting my favorite dessert again.
"Yes, it's my favorite." I pick up the fork on the plate and cut into it. It's incredibly moist as it folds, then bounces back into place. Popping the piece of pudding into my mouth, I savor the sweetness as it melts on my tongue.
She shifts her orange and gold embroidered shawl around her shoulders and leans back in to the plump cushion behind her. Cutting another piece of the dessert and pricking it with the tines of the fork, I glance over towards her as she stares at me, her head cocked to the side as she watches me with a wry smile.
"Well, dis-moi, how is it? I made it with dried ground conium maculatum, poison hemlock to you an' me."
"Ish very deleeshous." I attempt to smile with my mouth full of scrumptious pudding.
Marie claps her hands together gleefully as she laughs, "I'm so very glad demon...!"
Placing the plate down on my lap, I can't help but frown at her. She covers her lips with the back of her hand to stifle her laugher as she leans forward to pick up a black leather bound book on the nearby table.
"Marie, why do you keep calling me demon?" I ask her seriously as I sit the plate down next to me.
"Well why not? That is what you is, n'est pas?" She replies, flicking through the pages.
"I suppose but I didn't choose to be."
"I know chéri, I know. We never really choose to be what we are, but we can choose what we wish to become."
"Do you think I can?"
She shrugs, "That's up to you, isn't it?"
"I suppose you're right."
"Mon petit chou, I am always right." She chuckles. The tone of her laughter is so sweet and infectious that I almost want to join in with her; I want to feel as good as the sound she makes.
A moment passes and we settle back down again. I pick up the plate with the remaining half of the sticky toffee pudding on it and start to cut into it. Marie takes the book and leafs through it, both of us just enjoying the silence and the pleasure of each other's company. After a while, I finish the dessert and sit the plate down on the table. Reclining back into the davenport, I watch her read as my mind wanders.
"Do you think it's possible?" I mutter my final thought aloud.
"What's that?" Marie replies, keeping her eyes fixed on her book.
"Do you think it's possible that I can change who I want to become?"
"You tell me, chéri. Do you want to?"
"I think so." I nod.
"I'm gonna ask you a question now, you don't have to answer but it'd be best if you did." She states.
"All right?"
"Chéri, do you love that Sebastian?" She asks, her voice is low, almost whispered. Averting my gaze, I chew on my lower lip and stay silent. Marie gives me a knowing smile and sits the book down on her lap. "Oh demon, he is no good for you."
"I didn't say that I did!" I protest but she just shakes her head.
"Does it matter?" My mouth drops open to reply but nothing comes out. "I see. Oh, la, la, la..." She sighs. "What am I going to do with you Ciel?" She smiles.
"So you think I can't change?
"You have to learn how to be indifferent."
"That's very hard for me. Sebastian is... well, he is very important to me. It's hard for me not to feel something for him." I reply as I fold my arms across my chest. Marie instantly gets up from her seat and hovers in front of me, flapping her hands out to motion me to scoot aside, to which I comply.
Taking a seat right next to me and grabbing my hands, she holds them tightly as she stares at me hard. Taking a few deep breaths in and holding them for a moment, she slowly exhales as she closes her eyes.
Several minutes later, her eyes open gradually as she arches an eyebrow, looking at me suspiciously.
"He will only destroy you and will stop at nothing until he has done so."
"Destroy me?"
"Oui." She replies as she tilts her head to the side, eyes running the length of my body as she inspects me. "You are young, perhaps you do not understand just yet - but in time, you will."
"Will I?"
"Love… is a powerful force demon; it is greater than any magic that even I can produce and, like magic, not all love is good for you." She lets go of my hands, guiding them back down to my lap.
"What do you mean?"
"There are many different types of love, it's the one you feel the strongest that is the one that will have its hold on you."
"What type of love do I have?"
"It is hate."
"I don't understand, how can I love something I hate?"
"Oh mon dieu! You are young demon." She smiles, tapping me lightly on the hand, "Love and hate coexist so easily that it can be hard to differentiate between the two. They are two horns of the same goat."
Leaning over, her hands reach out and cup my face into her warm palms. I breathe in her inviting scent, an earthy cinnamon with a light, sweet hint of sugar, most likely picked up from when she was baking. She smells comforting and calming, and I feel completely at ease. Thumbs run over the curves of my cheeks as dark brown eyes lock into my gaze.
"Marie, what will happen to me if I can't be indifferent towards Sebastian?"
"What will happen to you? Who can say?" She answers quite casually. "Do you really want to be free of Sebastian?"
"Yes, more than anything."
"I wonder if that's true?" She muses to herself as she drops her hands back on to her lap.
"Of course I do!" I yelp, almost snapping at her.
"All right, all right, I believe you, no need to wake the dead or Baron Samedi will be afta you." She titters, leaning to the side and placing her elbow on the armrest, resting her chin in the palm of her hand. "I just hope you learn before it's too late, for your sake, mon petit chou."
"Too late?"
She smiles as she glances over at me, "Before you fall too deep and can no longer get out." She warns lightly.
…
Love.
What is love? I wonder.
Is it what the books would have us believe or is it what Sebastian feels for me?
Endless devotion verses possession, are they one in the same? I wish I knew.
Sebastian told me once that love is cruel, vile and sadistic, I believe him but I think there is something more to it. There must be, because I feel it too. I understand now what Marie meant about how love and hate can coexist because now the lines are blurred and I can't seem to figure out which is which anymore.
I lay motionless on top of my bed, vacantly staring up at the ceiling. The early morning sun creeps in through the gaps in the drapes, slowly spilling its light over everything it touches as it seeps through. I close and open my eyes slowly as I let my mind wander. I think of Marie often, these days, I think of her more often than not. I miss her; she understood me and never judged me, even though I am a demon. I still don't know how I could have killed her.
Sighing heavily at that thought and rubbing my eyes, I try to clear my mind but I can't, it's filled with nothing but thoughts of her. Rolling over onto my side, I wrap my arm around my pillow and hug it tightly to my chest as I continue to stare blankly towards my window.
Over the last few years, I've learned more about life than I ever have when I was alive. Above all else, I've realized that real hate is nothing more than real love and love is nothing but an obsession. All of those things that Sebastian told me about love, the possession, the desire to have that person above all else, the ability to die for them and to kill for them, it's all a part of the obsession.
This is what he feels for me and now I am starting to feel the same way too.
As I lay here, I start to enjoy my brief moment of peace. It'll only be a short while until Sebastian comes in to wake me, although, he knows I'm already awake. I'm sure he can hear me stir but he waits, as always, 7:15 on the dot and not a moment earlier.
'Ciel, Ciel, Ciel...' She calls out to me and I roll my eyes.
Why won't you leave me?
'Because you need me.' Alice giggles, her voice just as nonchalant and melodic as the first moment I heard it.
I need you?
'Don't worry, we'll help you.'
"Help me?" I utter to myself and she goes silent.
Alice?
'You need to be free of him.'
I don't want that anymore.
'He will destroy you.'
I know. I agree. This is something I have come to terms with, Sebastian will eventually destroy me.
The relationship between he and I these last few days has been nothing but terse, especially as I haven't forgiven him for throwing my gris-gris into the fire. I can barely stand the sight of him and yet he still comes. He still tends to me as though nothing has changed between us. He ignores my foul mood and placates my temper. However, despite my anger and rejections, it hasn't kept him from increasing his hold on me. In fact, he seems to take great pleasure in the knowledge that he's won.
He has won, he's over powered me and I can't help it, I cave in, always giving into him. Although, I know that each time I do, I lose another piece of myself.
Sebastian takes chunks out of me, each time I stay around him and every time he lays me down, I surrender another part and he takes it, greedily. It's almost nothing more than a game between us now, mere one-upmanship, although currently, he seems to be winning. He takes me over and I willingly give myself up, I let him possess me. Each time he does, for the moment I feel alive and needed but when we are through I feel nothing but hollow and disgusted with myself for giving in to him so easily.
I no longer have self, I no longer have control, I just have him and he owns me. He got what he wanted; he now possesses all of me.
Although, for however angry I am at him and however disgusted I feel, I still can't help but want him near me. However violent my temper, he does nothing but calm me. He brings out the beast in me, the demon I am now and I want to hate that part of me but I don't. I've embraced it, I love it, and I love him but I wish that I didn't, I wish that I could make all of this go away. I wish I didn't feel this hollow.
Releasing the pillow from my chest, I put it back behind my head, which then rolls over to the side. I look at the empty space beside me and sigh as my hand falls over on to the space. My fingertips run the length of the area, feeling the cold fabric of my sheets. I suppose there is one thing that I can't deny; I can't help but want him with me.
Exhaling loudly, I push the blankets off of my body, I suppose, it's time to get up.
Sitting upright, I stretch out; my joints pop and adjust themselves into place. I love to feel my body work, the movement and the sensation of everything falling into place. My feet land on the ground and I feel the wood on their soles as I start to get up and walk around, padding over to the wardrobe. Opening it, I can't help but smile to myself as I look around for something to wear. I know many will take this for granted but it's something I have come to enjoy, the solidary freedom of being able to dress myself.
Pulling out a high-necked white shirt, I take it off the hanger and slip it on, swiftly buttoning it all the way up. I then find a pair of trousers, putting them on and tucking in my shirttails, I fasten it around my waist. Going over to my dresser and grabbing a thick strand of ribbon from the top drawer, I wrap it around my neck, tying it into a neat bow as I wander over to the large bay window on the opposite side of the room. Sitting down on the bench, I push back one of the drapes and look out.
Even though it's early morning, it seems that all of New Orleans is awake. Smoke plumes from chimneybreasts and float out in the morning air. Dapper men in sharp suits hurry on their way to work and woman drag children along to the bakers down the street. I do this often, I sit here and I watch them go about their daily lives, seemingly without a care in the world.
How I envy these people, going about their business and living their lives with such ease until the day they die.
Everyone will get the chance to die.
It's something that I have always thought about, even when I was a child. It's a simple fact that I took for granted. It wasn't something that I was afraid of. In fact, I welcomed it.
Nightmares always tormented me, the past continued to haunt me - death would have been a welcome release from all the memories that keep their claws digging into me. Ripping my flesh apart from the inside. To go to sleep and never wake, to me, sounded like bliss. I wanted my revenge and after that, I wanted my death, a final end to things. I knew what it all meant when I made my contract with Sebastian, I knew and I was ready. I wasn't scared and I had been nothing but prepared for it. Then it was all taken from me.
'And are you still?' He asks, almost solemnly.
Am I still what?
'Prepared to die?'
I'm not sure Alois. What was it like?
'It was as painful and as frightening as you could ever imagine.' He pauses for a moment and emits an airy chuckle. 'You know, you should thank me.'
Thank you?
'I did you a tremendous favor Ciel, I spared you death.'
You think you did me a favor? I almost laugh at the notion. You've selfishly cursed me to live, you made me a demon!
'You were always more a demon alive than you are now.'
Is that so? Well, I suppose it is. It didn't matter how young I was, I was ruthless, cruel and disaffected. Everything that happened to me shaped me, created me, made me who I became and I didn't dare change it. Despite Lizzies' efforts and regardless of Madam Reds' wishes, I refused to heal, how could I? They took something from me and I wanted them to pay, I wanted to make them suffer just as I had. Did that make me as bad as him? Was I more of a demon then he was?
'What do you think?'
There is a knock on the door and Alois goes quiet.
Sebastian comes into the room, his eyes land on me instantly and he smiles to himself as I turn to look back out the window.
"You're up early." He comments as he walks over to my dresser and pulls open a drawer. Taking out a pair of black socks and two suspenders, he comes over and kneels down in front of me. His hand gently slides behind my calf and he uses it to turn me towards him. "Did you want to go out tonight? When you were serving Cybil, I found this excellent saloon I think you might enjoy."
I fold my arms across my chest and ignore him as he places my foot onto his knee.
"Not speaking to me today, are we?" He grins.
"I have nothing to say."
"Ah, there's your voice. For a moment, I thought you'd lost it." He simpers as he rolls the trouser leg up and starts to put on one of the suspenders around my upper calf. I'm always amused by these types of interactions. Sebastian knows that I am now quite capable of dressing myself and that I take pleasure in doing so but still, he continues to do things like this.
Leaning back, I cock my head to the side as I watch him slide the sock up and attach it to the latch of the suspender. He then puts my leg back down and brings up the other one.
"Why do you always do this?"
"Do what, young master?"
"I am perfectly able to put my own socks on."
"Of course you are."
"So then why won't you let me?" I ask as he finishes putting the other sock on my foot and rolls the trouser leg down, tugging at the pleat to ensure it falls correctly around my ankle. He drops my leg down and maneuvers himself in between them.
"It is something that I enjoy doing, something that gives me pleasure, my lord."
My nose scrunches up at that familiar term.
"Why do you still call me that? I've said before that I am no more an Earl than you are a butler now."
"But I still serve you." He replies.
"I'm telling you that you no longer need to."
Sebastian can't help but grin broadly as he rocks forwards, his hands land on the tops of my thighs as he comes closer to me.
"My, my, don't tell me that you now consider me an equal?" He purrs sweetly.
My eyes drift over to the side as I think for a moment. I snort lightly and fold my arms across my chest again as he watches my mind tick over.
"I wonder, will we ever really be equals?" I mutter to myself. His hands travel round the back of my thighs and towards my back.
"I don't know what you mean." He slowly pulls me forwards.
"Oh yes you do Sebastian. We've never been anything more than master and servant; however, I've always felt that you were just humoring me." I uncross my arms and drop them to the side as I lean back, resting on the cold glass of the window.
"Humoring you?" He delivers this with an arched brow as he starts to crawl on top of me; his hands creep up my sides, sending a sharp shiver down my spine.
"Sometimes I think it was you who was in control of me. You could control whether I lived or died in many different circumstances."
"True, however, if I really wanted you dead, you would be so." He retorts with a sly smile before he bends over and begins to nuzzle my neck. Raising my hand up, I tangle my fingers into his inky black hair as he runs his tongue up the back of my neck and behind my ear.
"Still, that doesn't make us equals; in fact it proves my point. You have the ability to end me, if you really wanted to." I sigh out as I start to squirm underneath him.
"Then I suppose the question is: do I want to?" His voice is so low; it's almost a growl.
"Do you?"
Sebastian pulls back for a moment. His hand roughly grabs onto the knot in my bow as he brings me forward. The color of his eyes flickers from the usual ruddy brown to the glowing rosette hue as he lowers his lids. He stares at me with such burning intensity that I feel as though two holes are being burrowed into my skull.
"Why all of this talk?" He questions.
"It's only natural for one to fear for their safety, especially given the circumstance."
"And you think that I would do something to harm you?"
"Haven't you already?"
He pushes me back into the window, causing it to rattle from the force.
"Is that why you valued your precious voodoo amulet? You really are scared of me?"
"No, that's not it at all."
He leans over me. "Then what is it Ciel? Why was it so important to you?" I turn my head to the side to avoid his gaze and I remain mute. "Don't tell me you cared for the witch."
My head snaps towards his. "Marie wasn't a witch. She was kind to me and she helped me."
"She tried to separate you from me, and that's something I simply could not abide."
"Well that's obviously not going to happen now."
"Is that so? And why's that?"
"Because...I don't want that." I resentfully admit. Sebastian lets a smile creep onto his lips as he looms over me.
"Then tell me, what do you want?" He purrs.
"I..."
"Go on."
"I don't want to love you."
"Why would you deny what you feel?"
"This isn't the type of love that I want to feel Sebastian. It's grotesque and flawed, this feeling I have for you, it – it tears me apart."
"My dear master, this is what it is like to be in love." He coos as he lets go of my bow and I fall back slightly. He hoovers on top of me, his lips are so close, I can feel them ghosting past mine. "It should take you, captivate you and tear you up inside."
And that it does.
You said it before, why won't you tell me again?" He moves down to my neck and starts to plant feather light kisses on my throat. "Tell me how much you love me." He whispers between kisses.
I breathe out as he continues to lick the side of my neck. I close my eyes as my whole body works against me, responding to Sebastians' every touch so eagerly. It shudders and squirms as it begs to be felt. I can't help but roll my head back, emitting a soft mewl.
'He will destroy you.'
Not now Alice, I know, I already know.
I know all of this and yet... I can't help it. Hands slide down my waist, they work their way over my belt buckle, unfastening and releasing me. Feverish kisses land all over my neck causing me to writhe underneath him. My back arches and my chest fights to make contact with his, just to feel him on me.
How many times?
How many times must I tell myself before I can believe it? How many times must I try to convince myself that I don't want this, that I don't want him? I can't love him and yet he is everything to me. All that I was and all that I am now belongs to Sebastian and I can't help it.
Fingers drag themselves up the ridges of his spine, feeling each vertebrate through the cloth of his shirt.
I want to disappear.
My head rolls back as I feel as his tongue trails across my chest. He hums loudly as he makes his way down. My breath hitches every time he breathes over a freshly moistened part of my skin, cooling it with each exhale. The sensation sends shivers throughout my body and my hands squeeze him tightly.
I want to dissolve.
My trousers are pulled off with little effort as he casually tosses them to the side. My hands reach up and tangle themselves in the drapes as he grabs my hips and moves them forward to position me. My eyes close as I feel the tips of his fingers drag themselves down the inside of my thighs.
I want to dissipate and spread.
He slides into me so easily and even though I'm ready, I can't help but gasp and whine as he moves within me. I grip the drapes so tightly, I'm sure to send them crashing down. A hand travels down my leg, lifting it up and over his shoulder. My whole body responds to his touch as it tenses with each contact made.
Breathe out and breathe in again as he goes deeper.
My cheeks flush as the embarrassment washes over me and I turn my head to the side to hide my face, bringing the drapes up and attempting to hide myself and to stifle my moans. Sebastian leans over, the back of his hand gently stroking the exposed side of my cheek. Taking my chin into his hand, he guides my face back towards him.
"Tell me you love me."
"I... love you." I pant breathlessly.
"Say it again." He commands and my head rolls back.
"I love you Sebastian." I cry out, my voice filling the air of the room.
"I love you too." He growls and I can't help the satisfied smile that forms on my lips.
I'm sorry Marie; you must be so disappointed in me.