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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
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Enlightenment

Sebastian pulls gently on the reins as the carriage rolls up in front of a small house along a side street in the Holborn area. This stretch is gaslit by well-spaced lamps. The buildings are narrow and tall, pressed against one another, a mixture of shops and dwellings. Some have shops on the ground level and rooms above for the families of those who own the businesses, or their lodgers.

Ciel observes that the businesses are proper, and look reasonably successful. From the signboards he can make out, they include milliners, an attractive sweet shop, a grocer's, a bookshop, an umbrella maker, and a maker of walking sticks. No public houses are in sight, and no dens where other vices might lurk. No one lies drunk on the cobblestones. The doors and few stone steps that lead directly to people's homes look clean, so these are respectable buildings, not a collection of hovels.

He has not expected the person he seeks to be living here. His imagination has been coloured by Lord Randall's account of the man staggering, raving and ranting, into the kind of rudimentary police station that London might have had fifty years ago, not too long after the old times when police "runners" used to operate out of magistrates’ courts rather than the proper, blue-lamp-fronted stations they have now.

Ciel also remembers what Lord Randall said about the succubus of half a century ago seeming to target evildoers. He has thus been imagining a loud, violent person living in squalor in a grimy tenement, not a small house that looks neatly kept, judging from its entrance and the clean curtains behind old but well-wiped glass.

So he was mistaken in telling Soma that this would be a dangerous errand – the place looks innocuous. For the first time, it occurs to Ciel that the man was spared because he was not one of the wicked previously picked out by the master of the succubus.

Sebastian opens the carriage door for Ciel and helps him out. The street looks quiet enough that there is a good chance the horses and coach will be left unmolested even if they both step away from it. So Sebastian ties the reins securely to an iron post, then steps up to the front door of the house whose number is written on the piece of paper Lord Randall gave Ciel. The butler raps on the door with the knocker. Through the drapes, they can see lamplight in the front room, and it is not eight o'clock, so they expect that whoever lives here is not yet abed. Indeed, a man's voice calls out: "Yes? Who is there?"

"Mister William Thompson?" Ciel asks, raising his voice just enough to be heard through the door.

That same door opens a crack, and an elderly man looks out a little warily from beneath a head of thinning white hair. "I am William Thompson. What is the matter?" He speaks carefully and distinctly, and peers curiously at the boy with a covered eye on his doorstep, accompanied by a tall man in black.

"Mister Thompson, I apologise for disturbing you, but may we speak with you regarding an incident you reported to the police some fifty years ago?" Ciel asks, lowering his voice now so that the neighbours will not hear.

The man's eyes widen a little, and he questions: "How do you know about what happened to me? You're not one of them, are you?"

They do not know who the "them" are that Thompson has in mind, but Ciel replies: "We are not from the police; neither are we people who would do you harm. We merely want to ask what happened to you, for the purpose of our own investigations. We obtained your name and address from a source who heard it from a man who used to be a police constable, and who now regrets that he did not take your report seriously."

The winter evening is too dark, despite the gaslight, for such an old man to be able to make out the crest on Ciel's carriage, which has stopped outside the shut-up millinery next door. But he apparently gathers from the manner of dress of the boy and his companion that they are people of quality, and concludes that they are unlikely to try and eat him. He opens the door wider, steps aside, and invites them in.

"Thank you, Mister Thompson," Ciel says, as he and Sebastian take their hats off and enter the narrow hallway of the house. “I am Ciel Winter, and this is... my tutor, Sebastian Michaelis.”

William Thompson leads them into his modest sitting room, where he offers them two clean and well-polished wooden chairs with faded cushions. He is rather thin, and moves quite slowly. As the “tutor”, Sebastian takes his seat beside Ciel.

"Would you like some tea?" Thompson asks. "I don't claim to have very good tea, but it is passable..."

"Grandpapa, who is it?" the soft voice of a child interrupts the man from above them – the visitors guess that the young person must be speaking from the first landing of the stairs leading up from the hallway. Footsteps inform them that the person is descending the stairs.

"Excuse me," Thompson says, stepping towards the hall again just as a girl of about ten appears in the doorway, in a light-coloured dress. "Jemima, why are you not upstairs with your brother and sister?"

"I heard someone at the door, Grandpapa."

"I have visitors, Jemima. Say good evening to the gentlemen."

Sebastian and Ciel have risen from their chairs. The girl drops a childish curtsey and says: "Good evening sirs."

"Good evening," they reply politely, Sebastian sparing her a smile.

"Go back upstairs so that your little brother and sister do not also come looking for you. Where is your nurse?"

"Nurse Penny is dressing Tommy for bed. I shall return to the nursery now, before she knows I am gone," the child says, dropping another curtsey to the visitors before obeying her grandfather.

"I'm sorry," Thompson says, shaking his head with a smile and shutting the sitting-room door. "Children will be children, no matter how one advises them.” Then he remembers that he is talking to a boy, and apologises: “No offence, young sir – you are so much more composed and serious than my grandchildren that for a moment, it did not occur to me to think of you as a child...”

“No offence taken,” Ciel says, although he is conscious of how many worlds away he is from the little girl, even though he cannot be much older than her.

“My grandchildren are staying with me whilst my youngest daughter and her husband are in Bath, visiting his brother, who is very ill. Oh yes, before I forget – tea?"

"Thank you, but no. We have just dined," Ciel replies.

"Very well," he says, lowering himself into a chair as his guests resume their seats. "What can I tell you about what happened to me so long ago?"

"Whatever you are willing to tell us," Ciel says.

"To this day, after so many years, I remain uncertain about what occurred, so I do not know that what I can relate would sound very rational."

"Even if you do not think that it would make sense, please tell us what you can remember, in as much detail as possible."

"I can tell you that I was going home in the evening from the office where I worked as a law clerk, near the courts. It was October. I was nineteen years old. I remember that I was eager to go home to my wife that day, for we were only four months married. It was late, and dark, for I had had much paperwork to get through – I was young, you know, and unproven, so it was important to work harder than anyone else.

"But it didn't matter that it was dark – I had never worried about travelling between work and home, because this place was not at all far from the old office, and the most I ever had to concern myself with was street urchins who might pick my pockets. We lived here even then, with my father. We were not so comfortable at the time, of course, for this was a pipe maker's shop where we are sitting now, and our family only had the rooms above. But we did better over the years, my father and I. When the shopkeeper wished to sell his shop, my father bought it from him, in order that the whole house might be his, and eventually mine.

"So I was walking home quickly, feeling perfectly safe, when I heard someone call out from a very narrow side lane not three streets away from here. It was one of those side lanes with no name, and not nearly big enough for a horse – you can see it if you turn left upon leaving this place, go past three roads and look to your right. I had never before entered that lane after dark, for it was completely unlit, and between the backs of two rows of shop buildings. I don't remember what the words were that I heard, or if I even knew what the words were at the time – I only know that I felt compelled to walk into the lane. What I next remember was something transparent, glowing white in the dark, horrible, looming over me, leaning towards me, and I felt as if all the life in my body was being dragged out of me. I couldn't stand. I fell to my knees, thinking I would never see my Mary again.

"But a light flared up, as if a match had been struck. A lamp was lit. A gentleman appeared, holding the lamp, and spoke the word: 'Stop'. The hideous thing drawing the life out of me floated back, and I could see the man's face, as he looked at me from no more than four feet away. The light of course was not good; it was hard to make out colours, but do you know, that hideous fog-like thing was giving off a white glow of its own, and I could actually see a little more colour by that glow than one would normally be able to by lamplight. It seemed to me that the gentleman's hair was silver – not colourless like mine is now, you know, but silver. It was rather long, hanging to his shoulders, unbound. I thought his eyes seemed a strange green – but I cannot be certain. He looked young, but he spoke with a gravity that did not sit well with his youthful appearance.

"He said to me: 'Forgive me. I thought I could accept drawing out half your life to sustain myself, but my conscience pricks me. I cannot do this. I chose you because you were a good man, for the spirits of the evil are rotten and hard to swallow. But I must not do this any more. I shall harm you no further. I am sorry for what I have taken of your life force so far – I cannot return it, but I have not taken much. I hope you will sustain no permanent damage from this. I shall never do this to you or to anyone again.' Then he put out the light and disappeared. The ghastly white thing left with him.

"I stumbled out of the lane, and wandered around for some time in a daze. When I gathered my wits, I did not go home, but went directly to the nearest building I could think of which housed policemen. They were moving from that station to another at the time, and no one wanted to listen to me. They seemed to think I was drunk, or mad, and threatened to lock me up. I was stuttering and sweating coldly, and I must have sounded insane. But I was not mad. Naturally, I didn't press the matter. Would you want to be locked up in a madhouse or a prison? I didn't. They took my name, wrote down where I lived, and threw me out. I calmed myself, and went home to my wife. Once I had thought the matter through, I decided that I was grateful to be alive. I lived the next forty-seven years with my Mary, our children and then grandchildren, and although the Lord took her home three years ago, I cannot be ungrateful for all the good years we had together because that gentleman spared me from that thing he owned. I never went to the police again about the matter, nor have I mentioned it to anyone before this, other than my father and my wife."

"Was your health harmed by what happened?" Ciel asks.

"I was much weaker than usual for some months after. But I became used to being that way. If I did not exert myself excessively, I was quite well. For a time, I feared that I would be a poor worker, for I tired easily. But I pushed on, and eventually became a lawyer – although a few years of that taught me that I had not the heart for the work. I later went into trade along with my father, then my sons and a son-in-law. I have little to complain about my life."

"It is good to know that, Mister Thompson.”

“Yes.”

“Do you recall what the man sounded like? English? Or foreign?"

"He sounded perfectly English, and his features too looked completely English. I have thought over the years that his clothes had a foreign air about them – something about the cut of his garments looked different from the general style of gentlemen's clothes in that day – but his speech and looks were English. He seemed well-bred. Very well-bred, I would say."

"Do you remember anything else from the incident?"

"That is about all I can think of."

"Thank you, Mister Thompson. You have been very helpful. I am grateful for your telling us what happened. We know we have imposed on you, and we shall trouble you no further. If you do think of anything, will you write to us, please?" Ciel nods to Sebastian, who hands over a card that has the name "C. Winter" printed on it, and the address of the manor.

William Thompson nods, and his guests rise. He looks at them curiously, as if he wants to ask what they are investigating, but then seems to think better of it, preferring not to pursue a matter he has let lie for so many decades. His visitors thank him, and he shows them out. They nod politely to one another one last time at the front door, before he closes it quietly, and they return to the carriage.

“What do you think?” Ciel asks.

“I think we should talk elsewhere so that the whole street does not become privy to our investigations,” Sebastian replies under his breath.

“We’re not talking loudly.”

“We can still be heard. Obey your ‘tutor’ now and get into the carriage.”

Ciel growls, but enters the vehicle nonetheless. Sebastian unties the reins, climbs into the box seat, and gets the horses moving. The street is too narrow for them to turn the carriage around without unharnessing the horses. So they clop along to the other end of the street and turn corners to make their way back to the main thoroughfare that will lead them back to Belgravia. Out on the main road, he keeps the carriage moving as smoothly as possible. The street is well lit and still busy with traffic at this time of night. By the time he pulls up in front of the town house an hour later, it is almost half-past nine o’clock.

Finnian has been watching for them through one of the front windows, and hurries out with a lamp to open the gate. Sebastian steers the vehicle onto the driveway and draws to a stop, then descends from the driver’s perch.

“Will we leave for the manor tonight, Mister Sebastian?” Finny asks.

“Young Master?” Sebastian redirects the query, stepping up to the body of the carriage with Finny and opening the door, only to find Ciel fast asleep, curled up on the cushioned seat, feet drawn up, hat and stick lying on the other seat.

“The answer to your question would seem to be ‘no’,” Sebastian remarks wryly to Finny, as Soma and Agni come tripping down the stairs.

The prince and the Brahmin have been concerned about Ciel, considering his earlier comment to them indicating that it was a risky mission he was on. Soma is about to call out Ciel’s name when Sebastian turns, a finger over his lips, to warn them not to make too much noise.

“His Lordship won’t like to be caught napping,” Sebastian says in a soft voice. “Go back to your rooms now while Finny sees to the horses. Don’t let him know you’ve seen him. We shall return to the manor tomorrow morning.”

Soma and Agni cannot resist peeking in at Ciel and smiling at the sight before they return to the house to retire for the night. It has been a long day for everyone, after all. Sebastian waits till Finny has unharnessed the horses and led them away to their stalls before leaning into the carriage to say: “Young Master, we have reached the town house.”

Ciel does not stir, so Sebastian speaks again, but gets no response. So he lightly taps Ciel on the shoulder, and only then does the earl sit up quickly, mumbling something unintelligible, and blinking at Sebastian, backlit against the open doorway of the house.

“Young Master, we are here.”

Ciel takes the proferred gloved hand and steps out of the carriage. Sebastian reaches back in to retrieve his master’s hat and walking stick before closing the carriage door. As Ciel ascends the front steps to the house, he follows closely behind all the way in case the boy stumbles, for he is groggy.

Sebastian sets down his master’s hat and walking stick on the half-table inside the door, and temporarily puts his own hat beside them so that he can escort Ciel upstairs. The earl sways a little as he takes the first few steps up, and Sebastian is immediately beside him, lifting him into his arms.

“I’m fine,” Ciel mumbles.

“Young Master, you have had a long and difficult day. You are worn out. I do not want you to tumble down the stairs.”

“I can walk,” he insists, but his speech is slurred.

“Prince Soma and Mister Agni are in bed. No one is here to see,” Sebastian tells him in a whisper.

“Mmm...” Ciel murmurs, finally giving in somewhat by making no further coherent statements of objection.

Sebastian takes the stairs slowly, rhythmically, tapping out a beat to a slow piece of music only he can hear. By the sixth step, the butler has the satisfaction of feeling the child sag against his chest and drop his head to his shoulder. He lingers on the steps to let his devil’s scent infuse Ciel’s flesh, so that by the time they are at the top of the stairs, he is content in the knowledge that Agni is not the only protector of the boy who has had his smooth cheek thus resting against him.

Into the bedroom he goes holding his master, finally releasing him carefully to the welcoming embrace of his bed.

“Perhaps you should not bathe tonight? You are very tired.”

“No, I want to get clean,” Ciel mumbles, sitting up slowly although he can barely keep his eyes open. “I feel grimy. I’ve been shot at and grabbed, and I almost sweated right through my coat giving His Royal Highness a piece of your mind.”

“Not only my mind, but yours also. I do not smell much perspiration on you,” Sebastian says, giving him a sniff. “Would it be acceptable if I gave you a sponge bath instead? It would be faster, and you could be in bed sooner.”

Ciel nods and allows Sebastian to help him out of the outer coat he pulled on during the cold ride home, the inner coat he wore to the palace, his waistcoat, and his shoes. The butler drapes a dressing gown about his shoulders to keep him warm before going downstairs to the kitchen to see if Finny has kept any water hot in anticipation of the earl’s return. This is an old house, and the earl has not as yet agreed to have any modern plumbing put in; so for now, they will have to do things the usual way. Sebastian is pleased to find that the gardener has heated a large pot not too long ago, and put a lid over it to keep the heat in. It will do.

He takes two buckets, covers them to preserve the heat, and carries the buckets upstairs. Ciel has obviously been to the bathroom to relieve himself in the chamberpot, judging by the disarray of his shirt and trousers, and is now without his eye patch, blinking owlishly into empty space in an attempt to remain awake.

Some of the water from one bucket goes into a basin. Washcloths are fetched, and the water tested to ensure that it will not be too hot for the child. Ciel clumsily pulls his ring off his thumb and unbuttons his own shirt while Sebastian slips the long trousers, socks and drawers off him. He begins to sponge him down, first washing his face and neck, taking care to leave his own scent on his cheek untouched. The butler makes certain not to drip water onto the bed, on the edge of which Ciel is still perched so that he will not feel too cold.

When he dips the washcloth back into the basin, wrings it out and starts wiping Ciel’s hands and arms, the earl says sleepily: "The man who controlled the succubus fifty years ago was trying to change for the better, if William Thompson's account is accurate. But if he was an associate, or the teacher, of Susan Rothstein, his friend or student did not reach the same enlightenment he did."

“A pity. It would have spared us some trouble, not to mention a bullet and a shirt, if she had followed in her friend’s footsteps,” his interlocutor replies mildly, dipping the washcloth in the water again before sponging Ciel’s chest and back.

“What most interests me is what Thompson said about the man's words to him about the spirits of the evil being hard to swallow,” Ciel continues slowly, forcing his thoughts through his tired brain, and ignoring Sebastian’s reference to being shot by him. “So he must have begun by sustaining his youth and life on the spirits of those he thought deserved to die, but found them not as nourishing as less corrupt spirits. He must then have thought that he could take some of the spirits of good people without killing them. But his conscience pricked him when he saw how Thompson suffered. That the police have no further records of him after that suggests that he never tried it again. So did he allow himself to age and die? Or did he find another way of extending his life unnaturally?"

"I do not have the answers to those excellent questions." Sebastian is now wiping Ciel’s thighs, followed by his shins and calves.

"Can we conclude that as Mister Silver Hair seemed to be a person of conscience fifty years ago, and has not been heard of since, that we can safely leave him alone, and trust that no further attacks of the kind Susan Rothstein and her succubus inflicted will occur in Great Britain?"

"I wish I could tell you so, but as we do not know enough about what happened to the silver-haired man, I cannot give you such an encouraging reply," says the butler, taking the bucket that is half-empty and placing it under Ciel’s feet so that he can wash his toes, soles and ankles properly in the water.

"I wasn't demanding an encouraging reply," Ciel mutters. "I merely sought your opinion."

Sebastian smiles and replies: "If you want my opinion, Young Master, it is that the silver-haired man remains an unknown quantity. He does not seem to be evil, but we do not know if he lives, and by what means. If anything could bring him out of his seclusion from the general notice of the world – if he lives – it would be the death of Lady Susan Rothstein. I would therefore recommend that we wait and watch, and not be complacent. We have many fronts to observe. The Prince of Wales must be encouraged along the path he seems willing to take, Sophia Easton may bring trouble once she learns from the servants that it was the Earl of Phantomhive who exposed her sons to the prince, and the mystery of the silver-haired man and his monster must be considered whenever we find a lead that tells us what might have become of them. We must not neglect the curry bread business either, or your sweet and toy business concerns."

"There's no end to my responsibilities," Ciel grumbles.

"That is as it should be, while you have life. You will always be a loyal servant to the crown. But those responsibilities and loyalties should be of justice and honesty, if you do not want to spend your life hiding the unwise deeds of whoever sits on the throne. That will leash you to them forever like a dog. You should be prized for the justice you can uphold for them, not the crimes you can hide for them, if you are to be all that you have the potential to be. Now do you want to wash the rest of yourself, or shall I do that for you too?"

Ciel reddens and snatches the washcloth from him to sponge down his private parts and his bottom.

“You are quite clean now, Young Master,” Sebastian says as he finishes.

But the boy states: “You missed a spot on my right cheek.”

To Sebastian’s chagrin, Ciel then picks up an unused washcloth from the side table, leans down to dip it into the water of the bucket that was not used to wash his feet, and sponges the devil’s scent off his face.

“Now I’m clean,” says the earl, handing the cloth to him and pulling on a nightshirt.

“Of course. You must sleep. You are worn out, and if you wish to return to the manor early, we shall have to leave immediately after breakfast.”

He lifts the bedcovers for Ciel at the same time as the boy starts to crawl under them. He tucks the warm layers over him and puts out the light in the bedside lamp, leaving only one candle lit in a holder. He pours the water in the basin back into the buckets, and carries the buckets out of the room. Then he returns to remove the taper, so that no light will disturb Ciel’s rest.

“Sebastian?” Ciel says, turning onto his right side so his face is half-buried in the soft pillow.

“Yes, Young Master?”

“You did very well today.”

“I believe that was my line to you.”

“It is now mine to you.”

“Why, thank you, my lord.” In the flickering candlelight, Sebastian’s features are unreadable.

“I liked Agni’s curry this afternoon,” Ciel says, looking keenly at his butler full out of his left eye, and half out of his right.

“Oh? Perhaps I can ask him to–”

“It was nice for a change, but it’s not my preference.”

“Indeed?”

“When we go back to the manor tomorrow, make me one of your chocolate gateaux.”

“Of course.”

“And...” Ciel mumbles with the last of his consciousness before he sinks into much-needed slumber, “...if you try leaving any part of me grimy again just because it was where you deposited your bloody scent like a spraying tomcat, I’ll squirt dog drool all over you...”

“Yes, my lord.”

The devil blows out the candle and leaves the room with a satisfied smile that no one can see in the darkness.
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Devilish Impulses