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It seems his young (not so young anymore, to be honest, he’s already seventeen, but to Sebastian, he’s still only old enough to be a baby; Sebastian would be a hundred times older, if not more) master is remembering that he has a wife; there’s no other explanation for this phenomenon.
And Sebastian can’t say when this thought occurred either. Everything seemed to have been the same as usual: Ciel, having successfully escaped his bedroom, like a true prodigal husband, came to Sebastian’s room and slept peacefully for the rest of the night in his arms. They even made love early in the morning, because Sebastian had seen a newspaper article about morning sex increasing productivity, and he thought Ciel would be happy to sort out his endless paperwork more than usual.
Then came breakfast, dull and cold. Every meal in this house was like that — boring and cold (except when they were alone together). Ciel ate, drank tea, read the newspaper, and ignored poor Lady Elizabeth, who was picking at her plate without much appetite. Sebastian, a vile demon with a sharp, vicious tongue, feigned concern as he asked if “his lady” was alright. Perhaps you’re not feeling well, my lady, hmm? For some reason, Lady Elizabeth blushed, flushed, and replied that she was fine and just not hungry.
Strange humans.
When Lady Elizabeth left, Sebastian asked:
“Are you sure she’s alright?”
“Does it bother you that much?” Ciel even looked up from the newspaper. He patted the chair next to him gently, and Sebastian grinned contentedly.
He sat down.
Oh, if you all knew how much he enjoys it when the master himself orders him to sit at the table with him! A joke. But yes, Sebastian really does like it.
“It worries me that no one eats what I’ve so painstakingly cooked,” Sebastian feigned a pout, knowing Ciel always finds it amusing.
It worked that time too, because Ciel smiled, and that’s a big deal.
His smile must be worth millions of pounds sterling.
His hand gently touched his shoulder, that small, graceful hand that Sebastian kissed with pleasure. Kissing hands is allowed, it’s not forbidden, and he’ll take advantage of it.
“Why no one? I’m eating, and I really like it.”
“Mm, I don’t believe it.”
And Ciel, without even bothering to glance at the doorway, gently brushed his lips against Sebastian’s cheek. A smug smile appeared on his face.
“That’s better.”
“You have very strange ways of getting praise.”
“It’s my fetish.”
“I know.”
Of course Ciel knows. How many nights have they spent exploring each other inside and out?
“…But still, it bothers me that she hasn’t been eating much lately. Are you expecting a new addition to the family?”
“Sebastian, don’t be silly. How can she get pregnant if I’m not involved?”
“Well, you never know…”
Ciel kicked him in the shin. Sebastian retaliated by pinching his thigh. Ciel has very beautiful thighs: thin, slightly sloping, and very pleasant to hold. It would be a sin not to pinch them.
“Stop it. You know perfectly well I’m, um, not intimate with her.”
Only with Sebastian.
Then Ciel retired to his study to work, while Sebastian trained the servants, who hadn’t improved their skills in over three years at all, and finished and redone everything they did themselves. A couple of times, he overheard Lady Elizabeth complaining to her maid, Paula (whom she’d brought into the house after the wedding), about how cold Ciel was. He left before she even woke up, and there was no intimacy between them at all! She thought he didn’t love her.
That’s true. He really doesn’t love her; that place in his heart has long been firmly occupied.
Not by her, but by Sebastian.
Ahem. Sebastian suppressed a malicious grin, continuing to rummage through the pantry. He felt like he’d become too emotional in recent years. Living surrounded by these short-lived, emotional creatures was having a detrimental effect on him.
Ciel had recently said he resembled an oleander. It’s a beautiful white flower, but damn poisonous; it oozes poison, the way people bleed when they’re picked. Sebastian took it as a compliment.
Ciel requested lunch in his study, and Sebastian brought him a main course, a salad, and dessert. While Ciel ate, he sat in the chair opposite, raptly recounting what Lady Elizabeth had said. Sebastian had recently discovered that he enjoyed gossiping with Ciel. Well, they could discuss what they disliked about a particular person or situation; it brought them closer.
“Mm, I see,” Ciel muttered, busily devouring a Viennese cherry tart. “I got it…”
Sebastian didn’t understand, what did he get, and still doesn’t.
Then Ciel returned to work, and Sebastian cut a few roses from the garden for him and placed the bouquet in a vase in the study. Then dinner. Lady Elizabeth expressed a desire to go home to her parents. Ciel said, “Go wherever you like,” and went to the dining room while Sebastian busily pretended to be furniture. In the end, they had a good time together. Sebastian bathed Ciel himself, just like old times, and put him to bed. In his own bed, of course.
The next day, after the lazy kiss, Ciel declared, “Sebastian, send out invitations to all those stupid idiots who like to flaunt their money and wives. Let’s have a ball. Today. And cook something delicious.”
If Sebastian weren’t a demon, he would have been horrified, but he is, thank the Devil, so everything is fine. He bought the rest of the groceries and cooked dinner for thirty people. He asked if they needed musicians, but Ciel, meanwhile leafing through a book, waved him off, like, “You’ll play, Sebastian, and now don’t bother me, I need to find the page I left off on.”
Later in the evening, he began dressing Ciel — it was a Ciel’s whim, of course. They kissed while Sebastian buttoned his shirt: Ciel paid for every button with his lips. And then, as Sebastian was putting on his shoes, he playfully threw one leg over Sebastian’s shoulder, and Sebastian, with great pleasure, pushed him onto the bed, pinning him with his body, breathing hotly on his neck while Ciel clung to his back and shoulders, trying to find a comfortable position to rub himself against Sebastian. The shameless boy — he seemed grown up already, but his insatiable nature was simply terrifying.
Sebastian had thought Ciel had remembered that he couldn’t be a recluse forever and needed to at least occasionally mingle with society (because rumors surface from time to time that Earl Phantomhive is covered in mold and mildew, or simply dead; of course, neither is true), but now he’s starting to think Ciel decided to throw the ball just to annoy him.
He’s not exactly good at it. Sebastian doesn’t particularly feel that languid urge to splatter the shiny tiles with blood, to destroy and rage; he doesn’t even want to break the strings of his violin, so his playing is perfectly smooth and effortless.
Ciel dances with everyone because Elizabeth doesn’t want to. She seems to have taken a liking to a young officer with a mustache. Judging by his accent, he’s Russian.
Then, a little tipsy and heated, they decide to waltz together: Ciel skillfully plays on any woman’s weak spot — her pity — and Lady Elizabeth agrees (partly because the officer is about to dance with another woman, an unmarried one).
Ciel probably wants to irritate him. Make him jealous. But Sebastian despises humans for that feeling (no less than for their fear) and won’t stoop to that level. It’s beneath him.
Besides, why should he be jealous if he already knows whose Ciel is and whose name he breathes out late at night?
Ciel tenderly kisses Lady Elizabeth’s rosy cheeks, like the petals of the hydrangeas planted in the garden last year. Ciel tenderly kisses Lady Elizabeth’s rosy lips, like the petals of the roses planted in the garden last year.
Dispassionate.
He glances at Sebastian from under his eyelashes. And smirks.
Sometimes Sebastian hits this knowledge like a glass wall: he knows it’s there, but he forgets it exists.
Ciel is such a bitch.
This doesn’t mean he’s a bad person, not at all. He just likes to play and twist Sebastian around his finger, but otherwise, he’s a very good person. Like right now, for example. He kisses Lady Elizabeth and glances slyly at Sebastian.
Sebastian doesn’t even think that Ciel needs to be shown his place. There’s no heat or lust in Ciel’s eyes like the one he looks at Sebastian with. He’s not serious. Ciel just wants to have a little fun.
It’s okay to let a child play with toys. Many parenting manuals say that children should be allowed to play; it develops all sorts of skills needed later in life, and also helps the psyche process the events that have just happened. So let Ciel have fun.
Sebastian continues to play enthusiastically.
The guests are buzzing, dresses rustling, sometimes ladies brushing against each other with their wide crinolines (a silly thing, frankly, Sebastian finds it terribly impractical), some have retreated to the buffet, others are smoking cigars.
An hour, two. While the guests are engrossed in champagne and pastries, Ciel, the careless host, drags Sebastian into the hallway. Away from prying eyes, but not far enough.
“Is something wrong?” Sebastian asks. Ciel usually does this when he wants to say something that shouldn’t be said in public: 1) someone needs to be killed; 2) someone looks suspicious; 3) someone wants to kiss.
The third option is correct. Ciel gently nuzzles his neck and looks at him from under his lush eyelashes. A touch of mascara, and they’re incredibly long. Sebastian doesn’t understand why Ciel likes makeup so much, but he admits he looks cute with it (but better without it).
“You’re not falling for it anymore,” he mutters, and Sebastian watches, mesmerized, as his soft lips move.
They’re covered in lipstick. A soft, delicate red, natural. Ciel dislikes bright colors and considers them vulgar. He’s an earl, not a whore.
“I don’t see the point.”
“You could stroke my ego.”
Sebastian doesn’t answer, but his expression must show that Ciel already has an enormous ego, because Ciel sighs and rises on his toes. With his heels, he’s tall enough for that, but habits die hard, as they say.
He gently presses his lips to his cheek. A soft red imprint remains, Sebastian knows.
Then another. And another. And another.
“Darling, don’t forget that they might see this,” Sebastian mutters, weakly and ostentatiously pushing Ciel’s head away from his neck, to which he clings like a vampire, but doesn’t bite, doesn’t drink in his bitter blood, but only gently sucks, leaving soft marks, soft red marks.
(To be honest, Sebastian likes to use pet names; he can’t call Ciel “Ciel,” can he?)
“It doesn’t matter. Everyone already knows I don’t love Elizabeth.”
“It’s not that,” Sebastian sighs. Ciel kisses him again — this time on the jaw — and he can’t resist, wrapping his arms around that tempting, slender waist, catching one of Ciel’s naughty hands in his own. Damn, these fragile fingers… “There’ll be a scandal.”
Earl Phantomhive indulges in debauchery with his butler. Sebastian would be horrified if such a headline appeared in the newspapers. He doesn’t care about his reputation; the human body’s shape is fickle, and so is a name. And Ciel? He can make fake documents, but he can’t take any form like Sebastian. It would be a disgrace to the entire family, a merciless and indelible disgrace.
Ciel doesn’t seem to be listening at all, too absorbed in his own task. He playfully places his free hand where proper young men shouldn’t, but Sebastian had overlooked that aspect of his upbringing.
He didn’t think Ciel would like it so much.
“Darling.”
“Huh?”
“Think clearly for at least a minute, please.”
“I can’t. I’m crazy.
It’s sad.
It seems this is also a game. Ciel cunningly leaves him in a state of agitation, his breathing quickening, and tries to flutter away with a teasing smile, but Sebastian catches him faster.
A contractor can’t escape a demon, nor can a demon escape a contractor. Those are the rules.
“Ooh, how mean!” Ciel giggles stupidly. He’s so drunk and cheerful. He probably thinks these advances will pass him by (or maybe he’s not even thinking about anything). “Totally unbearable?”
Ciel is such a bitch, and Sebastian loves him for it. It adds a little spice, keeps him on his toes. Ciel takes away peace and mercilessly destroys it, distorts it, tears it to shreds. He’ll tease you to tears, drive you crazy, and then caress you. An incomprehensible human.
Ciel sticks out his tongue at him, and Sebastian slaps him on the ass because grown men don’t stick out their tongues. Ciel tugs at his tie insistently, and Sebastian obediently bends over. Ciel kisses him somewhere on the head, and Sebastian brushes his lips over his fingers.
“I have patience,” Sebastian mutters, “unlike some.”
“How do you talk to your master, demon?” Ciel raises his eyebrows. He’s obviously joking, because he only calls Sebastian a demon at moments like this. “You’ve become completely insolent.”
Is that Sebastian? Nothing of the sort. He’s the most insolent of them all, and Sebastian isn’t shy about saying it.
“I need a reasoned answer, not mindless criticism.”
“You’re groping me even now. Is that not an argument?”
“It doesn’t count.” Sebastian doesn’t know why this doesn’t count. Ciel’s logic is sometimes completely baffling to him, and he tries to mind his own business.
Ciel wraps his arms around his neck, and Sebastian instinctively curls his fingers into his scalp, burying them in his soft hair. It’s a mechanical action, unthinking.
Ciel presses his lips to his, finally kissing the place he desires most. Sebastian purrs contentedly.
It’s a very deep sound, vibrating, resonating, responsive. Let it be known that demons purr very rarely, only in moments of peace and pleasure.
Sebastian tries to push his long, wiry, and hot tongue inside, but Ciel lightly hits him on the shoulder blade with his fist and holds him back. It seems Ciel doesn’t want to play this game yet.
He’s a strange. Humans…
When they pull away, Ciel smiles, his eyes glittering with a cheerful, drunken glint. Next time, Sebastian will watch his drinking. Too much alcohol is bad for human children.
Ciel, letting Sebastian straighten his tie, flutters off into the hall to entertain the faceless crowd with idle chatter, and then, when the guests have left, he will flee from the marital bed, just like any other night. An incomprehensible human.
Ciel’s lips are already clean.
03.11.25 — 04.11.25