"A speech? At St. Rudolph's middle school?" Ciel asked Mr. Matthews.
"This is a rather amazing opportunity. You are eighteen but you are the head of a company. The middleschoolers will be able to relate to you better. Since you're not valedictorian, it would be great to make a speech about leadership and the law" Matthews said.
"Didn't my aunt always do the speech? Why couldn't you find anyone else?" Ciel asked.
"I couldn't think of anyone else, Ciel. I was hoping for you to agree" Matthews replied.
Ciel bit her lip and then sighed. "Fine I'll do it".
A few days later, she found herself at St. Rudolph Academy's middle school. She had never studied at the middle school since she had moved here and started at St. Rudolph's high school. The campus was similar but the students here were noisier and smaller. Ciel sighed as she walked along the hallways by herself.
She spotted a small child of around ten standing in the middle of a deserted hallway. He was staring straight at her with his large dark eyes. Ciel furrowed her eyebrows and then walked towards the kid.
"Hey, what's your name?" Ciel asked placing a hand on the kid's shoulder.
The kid didn't answer but stared at her. Ciel began feeling a little creeped out and then heard footsteps in the hallway.
"Ciel! It's time for your speech!" Matthews said.
Ciel turned and then felt a hand claw at hers. She turned and saw the kid was gone. She glanced down at her hand where blood was oozing out from a horizontal cut on her wrist. She pulled out a tissue and held it to the wound. She glanced around the hallway and then turned to follow Matthews out.
She began her speech by speaking about leadership and how important it was. The students listened to her with rapt attention and many laughed at her sarcastic remarks as well. As she concluded her speech, she spotted the strange boy seated on the last seat, right by the door.
The students began clapping as Ciel left the podium. She kept a sharp eye on the boy who snuck out the door the minute Ciel sat down. Ciel leaned over and told Matthews she was going to the toilet. She walked around the hallways and then spotted a shadow disappear into the school science lab. She entered and then saw the boy crying with his face in his hands.
"Hey, is something wrong? Are you hurt?" Ciel asked walking towards him.
"I'm not crying because I'm hurt. I'm crying because no one knows the truth" The boy replied.
"What are you talking about?" Ciel asked.
"My death wasn't an accident. I was murdered" The kid replied.
"What's your name?"
"My name was Shankar Narayan" The kid replied.
"But you're not Indian" Ciel pointed out.
"I was Indian. In my past life, I was murdered. Everyone thinks it was an accident but it wasn't"
"Are you sure you haven't hit your head somewhere?"
"Even you don't believe me. I thought being the Queen's Dog you would help me. I want the world to know the truth. It's not fair that everyone thinks I died in an accident. I was murdered. I was a priest in a temple on the outskirts of London"
"What's your name now?"
"Damon Gallagher" He replied.
"Damon! What are you doing here? You should be at the assembly" A teacher walked into the lab.
She took Damon by the hand and dragged him away. Damon turned and focused his large dark eyes on Ciel. She shivered. These weren't eyes of an innocent child. They were eyes of a mature person who knew much in his life. She bit her lip and then decided that she should try investigating this case.
"You can't trust a small child. He could have been fooling you" Alois said.
"You should have seen him, Alois. He was so sad and determined. His eyes blew me away. He sounded mature and I could see that he had maturity beyond his years" Ciel said.
"How can someone have a past life? That's ridiculous" Alois said.
"Then how do you explain us? We have memories of our own past lives. This kid does too" Luke pointed out.
"You don't but we do" Ciel corrected.
"Because I died when I was too young. I probably didn't remember much myself" Luke said.
"How can this kid know about an Indian priest? He must have read about the case somewhere and he's blathering about it now" Alois asked.
"Shankar Narayan was a priest who worked at a temple in the outskirts of London. He died in an accident. I found these details in a police report. The area where he lived is rather densely populated so his death wasn't reported in newspapers or on TV" Sebastian said.
"So he's not faking it. He might really be the reincarnation of Shankar Narayan" Ciel said.
"We need to pay him a visit then" Alois said.
Damon Gallagher and his mother Anne lived in small apartment in London. Anne was a single mother working as a manager at Boots. She earned enough for a single mother and Damon seemed to have the latest gadgets around his home.
"Damon, honey? Ciel and Alois are here to meet you" Anne said knocking on the door of Damon's room.
"I'll only speak to Ciel" Damon replied from inside.
Ciel opened the door and then closed it behind her. Damon sat on the bed colouring at a drawing. She looked around the room and saw many drawings stuck on the wall with tape. Then she noticed that one wall was devoid of pictures but there were stains on the paint that Ciel recognized as tape marks. Ciel sat down on the bed and then peeked at the drawing.
"So you believe me now?" Damon asked.
"Yeah I do. I need you to tell me more about your past life" Ciel replied.
"I don't remember much but I draw what I remember" Damon reached out and pulled out two drawings that he had hidden under his sheets.
"Are these the only ones?"
"Mum threw away the rest that I stuck on the wall over there. She said it's not good to draw stuff like this" Damon replied.
Ciel gazed at one drawing. It was a large Indian temple that she had seen many times in textbooks during World History.
"That's the temple where I worked" Damon said.
"And this?" Ciel pointed at a drawing of a man at the bottom of a pit.
"That's me" Damon pointed at the man. "I drowned at the bottom of the lake".
Ciel's eyes widened and there was a knock on the door. Damon grabbed the drawings and slid them under the sheets.
"Damon, time to go to the psychiatrist" Anne said.
Damon stood up and then walked out of the room. Ciel stood up and then turned. She took the drawings and left the home with Alois.
"We've got drawings and this kid is the reincarnation of Shankar Narayan. How did he die?" Alois asked as Ciel drove back.
"That's a question that can be answered. We need to go to the temple where he used to pray and live" Ciel replied, her eyes narrowed on the road.
