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Devilish Impulses	By : Arianawray Category: > Black Butler (Kuroshitsuji ???) Views: 13948 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 2
Disclaimer: I do not own Kuroshitsuji or any of its characters, and I do not make any money from these writings.

Chapter List
- 1-Unwanted
- 2-Whim
- 3-Trust
- 4-Taste
- 5-Scheme
- 6-Command
- 7-Competition
- 8-Advice
- 9-Enlightenment
- 10-Sustenance
- 11-Caught
- 12-Breath
- 13-Arms
- 14-Inflammation
- 15-Imagination
- 16-Intent
- 17-Compromise
- 18-Sacrifice
- 19-Despair
- 20-Compassion
- 21-Interest
- 22-Equality
- 23-Mentor
- 24-History
- 25-Disorder
- 26-Reputation
- 27-Gifts
- 28-Admission
- 29-Watching
- 30-Bonds
- 31-Revelations
- 32-Confrontation
- 33-Struggle
- 34-Separation
- 35-Duty
- 36-Change
- 37-Together
- 38-Love
- 39-Epilogue: Heaven
- 33
- 34
- 35
Separation

Ciel punches Carsten repeatedly on the face, shoulder and chest as he is snatched screaming from the sphere where they have left Sebastian to his fate. The devil drops him on his feet and lets go of him once they are in the forest with the other humans and William T. Spears. But he seizes him again in a second when he lunges like a crazed animal at the soul reaper who is engaged in the delicate task of putting the finishing touches to the seal.

Ciel can hear himself screaming, can almost see himself – through a red mist of despair and rage – clawing at Spears, clawing at Carsten, striking Carsten with his fists, nails and palms, to no effect. Somewhere in his logical mind, which has been pushed into a corner and almost shut down, he knows this is unbecoming of him, and futile. He knows every scream and slap expressing his distress must be piercing his human friends and Sebastian too.

He knows it, but he cannot be sensible or logical now – he only knows he must get back to Sebastian, and never be apart from him. Devour me. Take me. Only let me be with you!

Over and over, he hits the only devil within his reach while Spears calmly seals the sphere, until no sign remains that it was ever there. When the reaper is done, Carsten releases the furious bundle of limbs he has been holding back, and Ciel rushes at the Shinigami.

"Undo your spell and open the doorway!" he screams into his bespectacled face. "OPEN IT!"

But Spears merely states in businesslike fashion: "The dimension now has two seals over it: a soul reaper's seal enclosing the space, and locks placed on it from within by the demon inside. I am certain you know him too well to believe he would allow you to create another doorway before he is no longer in danger of destroying you along with himself."

"Damn you!" Ciel yells, punching Spears on the chin but provoking no reaction from him other than a readjustment of his eyeglasses. Increasingly terrified for Sebastian, he hits the soul reaper a few more times before Spears mutters something, and Agni quickly steps up to clasp Ciel from behind, pinning his arms to his sides. Spears turns and walks away, disappearing into thin air along with the stragglers from the immortal armies.

Lizzie weeps into Mey-Rin's shoulder, wanting desperately to help Ciel, but fearing that everything she might do will only make things worse for him. The earl keeps struggling wildly against Agni's restraining hold until Jarvis steps up in front of him and puts his hands on his shoulders.

"My lord," the vicar says gently, so quietly that Ciel can barely hear him through the roar of the blood rushing through his head. "Please... stop hurting Sebastian with your despair. I beg of you."

His words affect Ciel subconsciously, for the earl can barely process what is said. Something about Sebastian... He quietens as the man continues to speak.

"Sebastian gave me this silver disc the day after your fourteenth birthday. He told me he had put a spell on it to take me to wherever you were, if it ever showed through its movements that you were in mortal danger or the greatest distress. He asked if I would be willing to be there for you if he should be unable to help you himself. I accepted it although I generally do not approve of magical matters. To be honest, I did not really think it would work. But I wanted to be of help to you, and to him, wherever possible, so he taught me how to allow the spell to do its job. I am glad that I said yes to his request, as it appears that I was able to be of some assistance. That, however, is the very thing prompting me to tell you that I believe you would only hurt Sebastian by trying to make your way back to him now."

Ciel stares back at him as his eyes fill with more tears, and whispers: "Why?"

"Sebastian wants above all else to keep you safe. Can you imagine his agony if you were to be with him inside that sphere, or if you should take him out of it, and he had to exist every second, every day, in fear that he would destroy you along with himself?"

"But can he imagine my agony?" Ciel cries angrily.

"Of course he can," Jarvis replies with feeling, for he too is upset that his demon friend has been left alone in a place they can no longer reach.

Ciel stares at him, tries to speak, but finds that he can produce only more tears. He suddenly feels utterly drained, no longer able to hold his head up. At length, he leans forward till his brow is resting against Jarvis' chest while Agni supports him from behind, not daring to let go.

"We must tend to that wound Azazel inflicted," the Brahmin says. "It mustn't become infected. Where is the carriage Lady Elizabeth came in?"

"Mister Tanaka must have convinced the coachman to go to the house with him," Mey-Rin says, still holding a weeping Lizzie protectively as she casts a glance towards the manor. Her eyeglasses are off, tears running freely though she keeps her voice steady. "I can see the carriage before the main entrance."

"Then we'll walk."

"If it is of any consolation, devils' claws are normally quite clean," Carsten murmurs. "People think we drip poison from every tooth and nail, but it isn't true for most demons. What I know of Azazel is that his claws are sterile for humans."

"That is of great comfort," Baldroy thanks him, smearing his tears across his eyes with his sleeve, for he has been deeply affected by Sebastian's declaration that he and the others are his friends, and by Ciel's unbearable distress. He forces himself to focus now on getting Ciel out of those blood-soaked clothes, bathed, and put to bed.

"I cannot enter the manor while that shield is up, but I will be out here if I am needed," Carsten mutters.

"Wasn't the shield put up with Mister Ambrose's magic?" Finny sniffs, still weeping. "I thought you knew how to use that."

"For most things. But if it is a protective shield of this nature, there is little I can do about it. It should be left up for now, in case any immortals still think of working mischief."

"Is our young master in danger from the demons?" Mey-Rin asks. "They said he was fair game for them."

"Not at present," Carsten answers.

"Not for now," Jarvis agrees. "I know from what Sebastian told me once, that God spared Lord Phantomhive – and also, I believe, Sebastian himself. What God has kept, devils shall not destroy. At least until Azazel's demons perhaps convene and change their minds, His Lordship should be safe. Besides, his present contract with Sebastian, if I am not mistaken, does not have his soul at stake, but is a voluntary contract on Sebastian's part. No demons therefore have a rightful claim to him. Those inside that sphere were wrong to say and do as they did."

"Good. Then let's get him to the house," Baldroy mutters urgently. "He's almost unconscious."

"He is," Soma affirms, examining Ciel's face as he hangs limply in Agni's arms.

"He is overwrought," Jarvis sighs. "Quickly now."

Ciel is in fact conscious, but everything in his body appears to have shut down. His arms and legs are the weight of mountains, his neck a limp thread barely supporting a head that feels like it is made of air. He understands that this is his body's way of forcing him into a state of rest after the rage and terror he has been through, but his mind continues to work furiously, thinking, planning, scheming, to find a way back to Sebastian.

For now, he lets Agni lift him into his arms and rush him back to the house. Indoors, they find Tanaka with Lizzie's worried coachman. The old steward stops them, looks into Ciel's staring blue eyes, then nods to himself.

"What is it, Tanaka?" Soma asks anxiously.

"His Lordship will survive. It will take time to heal, but he will live," the steward pronounces. "Not like in the first days after he returned from death four years ago – there was always a hint of death behind his eye – waiting to achieve revenge so it could all end. But he wants to live now."

Soma takes Tanaka aside to try and get more out of him in a quiet corner, while Finny runs to get hot water ready. Baldroy takes Ciel carefully from Agni.

"I will help you with his bath in a few minutes," Agni says to Baldroy. "I want to prepare a herbal paste that can be used to dress his wound. I know what Carsten said about those claws, but I want to be very sure."

"All right."

The chef whisks Ciel upstairs, where he finds that the boy is able to sit up on his bed. He peels off the shirt that was white this morning, but is now saturated with Sebastian's blood and some of the earl's own, then looks for something to put it in so it will not stain the carpet or floorboards. He grabs an empty pail from the bathroom and drops the shirt into it, then starts on the earl's shorts, first removing the papers that Ciel had buttoned into the pocket. Those papers are only slightly stained by blood. Baldroy puts them on the nightstand before returning to his task.

It occurs to him as he goes along that Ciel must be accustomed to being undressed in a very different manner by Sebastian, and he wonders when it began. For certain, there was nothing unusual between them when he, Mey-Rin and Finnian joined the household – well, apart from the fact that Sebastian was a devil, which he has only just learnt. Besides that, Sebastian and the earl had always been only butler and master. Until… when was it? That astonishing flare-up between them below stairs that night, when the master had knocked on his door and made him carry him upstairs while Sebastian glared – was that a lovers' quarrel?

The boy is too young… did Sebastian take advantage of him? No, the earl has never been like other children – he would not be easily taken without sheer force or seduced against his will, not even by a silver-tongued demon. Indeed, he is more cunning than most adults. Sebastian has plainly never employed force with the child – he would surely have been sent packing, devil or not, if he had. It must have been a step taken by both of them, a mutual affection…

A knock at the door is followed by Agni's appearance, then Finnian's. The gardener prepares the bath, Agni checks the temperature of the water, and Finny leaves the room to give the earl some privacy. Baldroy and Agni partly coax and partly lift the boy into the bathwater. They wash him thoroughly but quickly, paying special attention to his hair, matting with rapidly drying blood, and the puncture wounds inflicted by Azazel. Agni observes that while the earl is silent and still, his physical strength drained, his eyes are alert, as if he is thinking fast and hard.

That is very likely to mean Ciel will recover fully once he has had enough rest. But it also means trouble: the boy will not give up trying to reach Sebastian, and that could put both him and their demon friend in danger.

The bath done, Baldroy dries Ciel's hair and body, slips his drawers on, and lets Agni dress the wound with the herbal paste.

"I'm wrapping the paste in gauze so it will not irritate his skin through direct contact," Agni explains. "The gauze will not prevent it from drawing out poison that may be in the wound. These herbs are said by learned healers in my country to be powerful enough to combat the effects of injury by the claws and teeth of dangerous creatures, both of our world and of others."

Baldroy nods as the Brahmin winds the bandage around Ciel's shoulder, one paste-filled gauze sachet against the wound in front where Azazel's thumb-claw sank into the flesh, and a larger sachet against the wounds on the back, where his fingers dug in.

They button a soft nightshirt over his body, lay him down against the pillows, and pull the blanket up to his chin. Only then are Elizabeth and Mey-Rin admitted to the room. Ciel has closed his eyes, so Lizzie sits on the bed, leans over and kisses her cousin on the cheek before sitting back to watch over him quietly.

"When Lady Elizabeth leaves the room later, have Finny sit with Lord Ciel while he rests," Agni says in an undertone to Baldroy by the door. "I didn't like that look in his eyes earlier. He's planning to get back to Mister Sebastian's side as soon as he can. If he succeeds, it could put both of them in immediate peril. If Mister Sebastian is truly in as volatile a state as those other immortals have implied, he needs to be quiet, calm and alone for a good while."

"I was thinking the same."

So Finny watches Ciel that afternoon. Baldroy relieves him when he comes upstairs with food for the earl, for the boy has eaten nothing all day. The slender pieces of chicken boiled, then seared in a pan with finely chopped greens and mashed potatoes go down easily, but after that, the earl only lies down again and shuts his eyes.

Soma sits with him in the evening; Agni takes over for the first part of the night after Lizzie and Jarvis have left the house, and Finny is again on duty for the second half of the night. However, the gardener is rather sleepy by now, and dozes off at some point. He wakes with a start about half-an-hour after dropping off, but already, the bed is empty and the earl gone.

***

The hours of lying in bed, thinking hard but not sleeping, have not improved his physical condition. He is drained and on the brink of falling sick from over-exertion, but his desire to find a way back to Sebastian lends him energy. By the light of two lamps – one from his bedroom and another which is always in the study, he searches grimly through Percival Ambrose's piles of papers.

Can anything here show him how to break into a sealed space with two layers of magic over it? Anything that will show him how to circumvent a separate dimension's internal seals put in place by the person still inside? Even if it is a complicated spell that will take him weeks to work out, he will do it. He must.

He reads page after page until his head spins, but he ploughs on, ignoring the footsteps he soon hears in the passageway. Finny has found him, naturally. However, finding him does not mean he can force him back to bed. Ciel learnt that much the day he, Sebastian and Commissioner Randall were unable to do a thing as the Eastons died one by one beyond a wide-open room door.

"Young Master!" Finny wails from outside, banging on the door. "You're not supposed to be out of bed!"

"Finnian, I appreciate your care, but please leave me alone," Ciel answers, running his eyes over a leaf of a journal that at first looks promising, but quickly turns out to be useless for his purposes.

"My lord...!"

Other footsteps, other voices, other worried calls. A repeated jiggling of the doorknob, and the jangling and inserting of keys follows. He has locked the study door and windows, but they will soon discover that even if they force these physical points of entry open, they will be barred from entering the room, just as Randall's men and even Sebastian were barred from charging into the Tower apartment where Mrs Easton and her sons met their end.

He shuts out every sound and every spoken word, clinging only to Ambrose's mountains of written words. He does not turn his head when someone scales a ladder and raps at the window. The curtain is drawn, anyway; whoever it is – Agni, most likely – cannot look in. Ciel does not even look up when the study door bursts open at last, when Tanaka agrees that Finnian should break it down. He is now within view of his household and Soma, but does not spare them a glance. They will discover in moments that they cannot enter the room although the door is open, for the earl has erected the kind of shield that Ambrose and Carsten crafted at the Tower. Carsten might perhaps penetrate it after some effort, but he is barred from the manor by Sebastian's shield, which the butler has built to survive his absence.

"Are you using more of Ambrose's magic to keep us out?" Soma howls, after walking into the invisible wall.

"Young Master!" Baldroy calls. "Please don't do this now. We won't stop you later – after you're rested. Take down this... thing you've put up, and let us in!"

Ciel does look up then, his tired eyes burning with determination. "You have all done more than I could have asked, as it is," he says. "Thank you for everything you did to help me and Sebastian. But I must ask you to go back to bed now, and leave me alone."

"At least for tonight, my lord, you must rest," Tanaka pleads, in one of his moments of absolute clarity.

"When I've found what I'm looking for."

"Ciel!" Soma cries angrily. "Please don't do this!"

"Sebastian has been in that prison for too long already. I don't even know if he's dead or alive. I'll rest after I find a way in."

After that, no matter how they shout and plead and scold, he ignores them. Beyond the room, they watch helplessly as he flips through stack after stack, book after book, and reads endless words until the sun comes up. At first, he only looks tired, the shadows under his eyes darkening. Then he stumbles as he walks to the shelf the tenth time for yet another stack of papers. He ploughs on, but the fourteenth time he goes to the shelf, he trips, falls, and lies unmoving on the floor.

"Damn it!" Baldroy hollers, thumping the invisible, transparent wall blocking the doorway. "Mister Agni! Stay here and keep trying to break this shield! I'm going out to the forest to find Carsten. He may have an idea how to get through this thing."

"Wait! The young master is moving!" Mey-Rin cries.

Ciel drags himself up into a sitting position, using the desk as support. He plants his right palm flat on the floor, murmurs an incantation, and the invisible wall drops. Finny tumbles into the study. Baldroy leaps in over him, and scoops up the exhausted boy.

For days, Ciel lies in bed, barely able to lift a hand. They tend to him every minute he is awake. He is so helpless, though, that they are not afraid to leave him alone for the most part while he sleeps, for he cannot even sit up unaided. They pay for that presumption on the fourth day when he disappears again in the middle of the afternoon. He has been able to walk for about a day now, but has concealed that fact from them while he gained strength.

At last, they find him out in the woods, sprawled on the ground in the rain, clutching a leather-bound journal in his left hand while his right feebly draws symbols in the dirt. Carsten stands a few feet away, watching him in silence. The devil meets Agni's eyes as the humans emerge through Sebastian's shield and gives a shake of his head to say: What he is doing will not work, but he is trying anyway.

Ciel fights Baldroy as the man lifts him off the cold ground. A hoarse cry issues from his throat, every fibre of his being resisting removal from the place where the doorway was sealed.

He is not left alone for a moment after that.

Lady Francis visits him again – it is her third visit since Lizzie went home several evenings ago and sobbed in her arms as she choked out the news that Sebastian was lost in a strange place, and Ciel was lost without him. The lady has never seen her nephew in such a dreadful state. He physically appears to be on the verge of death, but his eyes – both his beautiful eyes, miraculously whole again – are filled with blue fire and a determination to live.

"Ciel!" Lady Francis cries. "Oh Ciel, what are you doing to yourself?"

He will not, or perhaps cannot, talk to her. She sits with him all that day and the next, and feeds him with the devotion of a mother. She has always known that there was something unusual about Sebastian, but has never been much surprised by that, for her father and brother always kept remarkable associates and servants. What does surprise her now is to discover that her brother's son has such a deep attachment to the missing butler. Elizabeth has said nothing of it, but Lady Francis has seen all kinds of things, and she has a good suspicion about what is going on.

She does not approve. She is devoted to her husband and children, and does not believe that there should be other ways of putting couples and families together. However, this is not the time to lecture her nephew about it. Besides, the butler is gone.

It is Lady Francis who first advises the earl's household that instead of keeping him from doing what he wants, or preventing him from going where he wants, they should help him. She has gathered from things Soma and Finny have blurted out that Ciel is trying to find Sebastian, apparently an impossible mission.

Knowing his obstinacy, she believes it would be best to let him try until he either succeeds (in which case she will deal firmly with whatever is unhealthy about the connection between him and Sebastian in time to come), or fails utterly (after which she will remind him that he also has a responsibility to his monarch, his country, his relations and his household).

So after she leaves the manor, Ciel's staff and friends bring Ambrose's papers to his bedroom a stack at a time, returning the materials in their proper order to the study whenever he is done with each lot. Every day, they take turns to help him out to the forest and let him search for a seam between the worlds.

This goes on for days, until the afternoon they enter the forest to find Azazel waiting for them. Finny, escorting Ciel, panics. But Carsten swoops in and stands between Azazel and the two humans.

"Don't fret, little brat," Azazel offers a smile that is a curious blend of mocking coldness and reluctant sincerity. "I hate to say that I come in peace – that would be most inappropriate – but I am not here today to eat you or your friends, or to convey any message of war."

"Why are you here?" Carsten demands.

"To deliver a different message."

"What is it?" Ciel asks, as Finny readjusts his grip on his arm and waist.

Azazel answers: "Only that we of the infernal worlds – all the infernal worlds – have been informed by those who should know that you are no longer among the souls that demons have a right to take. It seems your revised contract with your demon is not the kind of arrangement that would entitle any of us to make a meal of you. So you may rest easy for now, young Phantomhive."

"And Sebastian?"

"Interestingly, we're not to bother him either. It appears that he has become a law unto himself, at least where devils are concerned. He answers to none of us now, not even Lucifer."

"Does that hold true for all time?"

"I couldn't say, but it is possible."

"If the conditions change, will we receive fair warning?"

"Naturally," Azazel sighs. "I did visit your Sebastian the night before battle, to warn him exactly what would happen unless he stopped what he was doing. He didn't listen. Anyway, you may be at ease for now – but don't rest too easy."

"What do you mean?" the earl questions.

"Do you imagine that what you and he have done, separately and together, has gone unremarked?" Azazel sneers.

Ciel narrows his eyes and considers the rhetorical question.

"Did you think you were an exception?" the green-eyed demon continues. "A favourite of God's? Use your head."

Ciel is well aware that nothing he has done in the past four years of his life could possibly be acceptable in the eyes of heaven. But he has not considered the implications too deeply, until now.

"You have been responsible for numerous deaths," Azazel elaborates. "By the laws of heaven, that makes you a murderer. Your demon has executed countless humans and several immortals by your command. He was in a contract, so his actions were your responsibility. What occurred in that dimension in which he is now sealed is a different affair – that was an episode of war, and all is fair in war. But before that, entirely of his own accord, he slew many humans of the underworld to keep you safe. Those deaths are entirely attributable to him. You may consider such people evil, but many of those human lives he took were lives he had no authority to end, souls he had no authority to devour. Do you really think you or he will escape condemnation for those acts?"

"No," Ciel states quietly, accepting the sense of what the devil before him is saying.

"Even if you somehow obtain forgiveness for all that, there is the small matter of your carnal intimacy with one another. Dear boy, my fellow-Watchers and I were cast out of heaven for exactly that sort of thing, except that most of us went about it with women, not men. People think it was an immense crime because of the unusual offspring we produced, and perhaps it was. Our defeat and our damnation involved not only the loss of heaven, but a complete alteration of the way our bodies and spirits were composed – any offspring we might think of creating with human females now would not survive. Those rare ones who might thrive, like Merlin Ambrosius, would be no more than human, only perhaps with unexpected powers. We no longer have the ability to sire the great demi-gods of old. So yes, spawning beings of terrible ability was a crime. But I think you know your religious history, even if you aren't of a spiritual bent – relations between males are equally unacceptable by heavenly laws, despite the resulting lack of offspring."

"I know."

"Good. So don't imagine that God will play favourites here. Your devil will be punished, and so will you. Consider this separation – his imprisonment in solitude, and your living without him – as the start of it."

"I didn't know that devils acted like prophets of God, delivering messages of crime and punishment," Ciel remarks evenly.

"You'd be surprised," Azazel grins. With a flash of his bright green eyes, he spreads his glossy black wings and disappears into the air.

"You needn't listen to him," Carsten states gruffly. "No devil acts on behalf of God. He is speculating as much as any of us could."

"He isn't far off the mark, though, is he?"

"Maybe not, but not all wicked deeds are permanently branded for condemnation," comes Agni's voice from a little way off.

Ciel turns to see his Brahmin friend, with Jarvis, approaching from the direction of the manor.

"How much did you overhear?" Ciel asks.

"Enough," Jarvis replies. "He knew we were here, but he chose to ignore us."

"Everything he said was true," Ciel admits. "I may not like to believe it, but he is right."

"Only to a certain extent," Agni responds. "I don't know if what has happened has anything to do with punishment, but I do know that punishment is a good thing – if it comes in place of utter damnation."

"Are you speaking from experience?" the earl asks.

"Of course. You know my past. I have been open about my history to you. My deeds were evil indeed to have brought about my sentence of death, then Prince Soma spared me. I have spent years repenting. My repentance will never erase the effects of my crimes – the people I killed remain dead, their families remain resentful. My repentance may not be enough to erase the memories that haunt me. Yet I remember how, when we were in that sphere, the devils said you were fair game for them, but never pointed me out. I would have been an obvious target for them, as I have done so much evil in my life – more than you – and I even worship gods other than yours. Yet, none of those devils fingered me as someone they had a right to cut through to get to you. I thus believe that true repentance can cast a person's past in a different light – it cannot erase the facts of what happened, but it can make some measure of forgiveness possible."

"But I don't repent of anything I've done," Ciel declares staunchly. "Not what I did to avenge my enemies' humiliation of my family name, not what I did to keep my household safe and the queen well, not what I did with Sebastian."

"Maybe repentance for you will be something different from what it was for me," Agni suggests. "Or maybe it isn't the right time for you to see things from a different perspective."

"The time will never be right for that," Ciel states. Then he looks at Jarvis, defiantly. "So what would your God have to say about an obstinate soul like me now?"

"I don't know," Jarvis admits. "May we talk for a while, to see if an answer of sorts emerges through that? Mister Agni, Finnian – would you please leave us? Carsten will be here to help us if any other unwelcome visitors arrive, am I right?"

The devil shrugs as if he does not care, but remains where he is, while Agni tells Finnian that it is all right – they can leave Ciel with the vicar. Finny has a small blanket draped over his arm, which he brought with him from the house in case the earl felt the cold. He spreads it on the ground and seats Ciel on it. Then he takes off his own rough gardening jacket and lays it on the ground too for Jarvis to sit on.

As Agni and Finny walk away, Ciel asks: "Well? Shall we talk about the repentance I won't be going through?"

"No," the vicar replies. "Because I know you are not ready for it. I hope God forgives me for saying this, but having seen how you and Sebastian fought for each other, I shall assume that when he returns, you and he will go right back to where you left off. So no, we shall not be talking about repentance. Instead, I am going to talk to you about Orpheus."

"Orpheus? Of Greek myth?"

"Yes. Orpheus of Greek myth. I would have said 'myth' without a doubt only a fortnight ago, but having seen what I saw in that sphere, I wonder if what we call myth may not have been fact after all."

"What do you want to tell me about Orpheus?"

"I think you know, my lord. You have studied Greek mythology better than I have. Sebastian gave you an excellent education in the four years he was with you, and you must have been well taught by your parents and tutors in your early childhood."

"I suppose you're going to tell me about his visit to Hades."

"Of course I am. I think you know what I intend to communicate through that story."

"You will tell me that I will harm Sebastian by trying to see him before the time is right, as Orpheus condemned Eurydice to Hades forever by turning to look at her prematurely."

"You know the theory, but you do not believe it will happen."

"No."

"But what if there is a possibility that your breaking into that world could cause Sebastian's powers to become unstable? What if your gaining access to him hastens his destruction?"

"That is only a possibility. There is an equal possibility that he is already well, and ought to be released at once."

"Is that a chance you want to take?"

"It is a chance I believe he would take."

"Not if your safety were at risk."

"Because I am a fragile mortal with no talent other than for getting kidnapped – that's what he always tells me," Ciel mutters. "He wouldn't risk damaging me. But he's a strong demon – he's powerful – he'll be fine–"

"He is as fragile as you are now," Jarvis tells him.

"No he's not... he's Sebastian. He..."

"He is at this time as delicate as you. He was almost condemned to slavery by Ambrose's magic, remember? He is not invulnerable. This moment, he is exceptionally vulnerable. Would you risk his well-being for the pure impatience you feel to look upon him? Would you make the same mistake as Orpheus, and gaze upon your loved one too soon?"

"I..."

"Would you risk it, my lord, if there was even a small chance that you would destroy Sebastian?"

Ciel is silent for several minutes. At last, he answers softly: "No."

"It is good for you to come out here from time to time to feel closer to him," Jarvis says. "But will you promise yourself that you will stop trying to see him before the time is right?"

Ciel is silent again for many minutes, at the end of which he says: "I would like to be alone here for a while."

"My lord..."

"I won't do anything stupid. Just let me alone for a while. You or Finny can come back out to get me soon."

Jarvis looks into his eyes, sees a different kind of determination there, and nods. He gets up and walks far away enough to give Ciel privacy, while still keeping him within view. Carsten simply strides off.

Alone in the forest, at the very spot where he had opened a doorway into the world where Sebastian battled armies for his sake, Ciel stands shakily and reaches out the way he did when he first sliced open an entrance with Ambrose's magic and his fingertips. He feels nothing now – no form of magical resistance to tell him that he might be able to cut some invisible plane the way he did before. No sense of a point of access to Sebastian's prison.

Yet, he knows it is there before him. So near, but so impossible to reach.

He steps forward, knowing that if he could open a doorway, he would be inside the sphere now. He walks on slowly, visualising that space in his mind, until he gauges that he has reached the spot where he last kissed Sebastian. He sits on the forest floor, closes his eyes, reaches a hand out to where his lover might be, and imagines his demon's hair and skin under his fingertips.

"I'm not giving up on you," he whispers. "Don't you dare give up on me while you're in there."

Still with closed eyes, he pictures trees springing up around Sebastian in that barren space, grass growing under him, hills in the distance, cradling a pool of water that will always remain fresh. Stars in a twilight sky. Gentle warmth emanating from the very walls of that sphere. He doesn't know if he has any power over this space that belongs to Sebastian, but Ambrose once believed he had created a vast forest in the shadow of the spell, so maybe he can make a better kind of world for Sebastian now.

"I can't see you," he says quietly. "Not if it means I might upset your healing, or make your powers unstable. I don't know if it is divine punishment or not, but if we are intended to be apart for a time so you can heal properly and lead the fullest immortal life you were meant to, then it must be so."

He doesn't want to cry. He never was the sort to weep. But he is looking at Sebastian in his mind through a wave of tears as he whispers the blessings he wants to give his devil for now – until they can meet again: "I hope to give you a good place to rest in while you heal. I hope those trees are growing, and the grass is soft, and the water pleasing. You always put me to bed so carefully – how little I can do for you in return... I don't even know if it's working... if I'm doing it right..."

His tears are falling, striking the dead leaves on the forest floor.

"Rest well, Sebastian. Rest all you must, then come back to me."

He presses the fingers of his right hand to his lips, and puts his hand out to give that kiss to the demon he cannot touch. He holds his hand out for as long as he can, willing the kiss to cross worlds and arrive on Sebastian's lips. Finally, he gets to his feet and walks slowly back towards the edge of the forest, where Jarvis is waiting patiently to help him back to the house, to his friends, and to the rest of his life, which must go on, somehow.

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Author's Note: Thank you to everyone who has taken the time and trouble to give me thoughtful reviews, on this and other sites, and for all the encouragement and support.
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Devilish Impulses