It Started With a Fire

It Started With a Fire - Chapter 1

Chapter 1

Fire

Fire.

There was a fire.

He couldn't stop it, his eyes flickering with orange flames, glittering with tears. He watches, unable to move as his family burns inside...

Then he wakes up with a scream, panting, sweating, eyes wild. He sits in the dark room, clutching the sheets, dark shadows threatening to pounce from corners unseen.

PLIP

PLIP

PLIP

He looks down at the droplets of water staining the silky white, at his blurred vision creating waves in his hands.

"My lord," a rough voice smoothly calls from the door. The boy in the bed jumps at the sound. "Why are you weeping?" His butler asks calmly, floating over to the bed. Ciel takes a deep, long breath. The tears cease. "It was just a dream." He replies, wiping his eyes and sitting back. His butler nods, lighting the candle beside his master's bed. "No!" Ciel says, then shakes his head. "No, please don't light it..." He looks away, ashamed.

"Ah, I see..." Mutters Sebastian, smothering the flame, not getting so much as a speck on his monochrome gloves. The butler then kneels beside the bed. "You can leave, you know?" Ciel whispers, his eyes glazed in tears. "I will never leave your side, young master." The demon replies, trailing a masked finger across the child's jawline, not failing to make the boy's eyes close in a shudder.

He nods, looking away from his servant. "Ah, ah, ah..." The butler prompts, gently pushing his face back to look at him. "Not so fast, we must prevent such dreams from recurring." Ciel just stares into those haunting eyes, subconsciously leaning possibly a bit too close...

"How do you propose I do that, then?" "Well, young master, I shall hate to agitate you in any way, but I dare suggest you speak of your fears." Ciel is not known to be one fond of talking, nor was he one for displaying emotion; which was mere weakness in his eyes. "No." He says, sitting all the way up, dangling his feet off the bed to face Sebastian.

There is a long silence, where all you can hear is the clouds covering the moon, the wind almost moving through the house at the onset of rain.

"I've forgotten what they look like." The butler nods. "My parents always seemed sort of... Phantom-like to me... They were never really there, one could say, but I still felt grief... I still knew that they were my parents and that they... Loved me..." He twists the ring around his finger, entranced by the way the silent lightning dances across the deep blue gem... "This is all I've got to show for it..." He finishes.

That was enough for him and his demon, for they both knew anything more would be too much... They knew that if he spoke of his frequent panic attacks or his forgotten smiles he would simply crumble into a mess of a child, too many tears have been bottled up for fear if he let them loose, a great flood would occur... It would, if he did...

Sebastian does not press further. "Very well." He replies to the unspoken comment. "Thank you, Sebastian..." "For what, my lord?" The boy shrugs, his common personality of rough defensiveness gone for the night. "I am certainly aware that you are merely my butler, Sebastian..." He pauses, searching for the right words to string together. "And yet I do care about you, I dare say... So I thank you for staying by me, even though it he your duty." "Well I am simply, one hell of a butler." The demon's dark hair falls in front of his face, his smirk one of mystery.

Rain begins to pelt the large windows, the first crack of thunder echoing through the silence that ensues.

"Sebastian?"

"Yes, my lord?"

Ciel looks into those haunting red orbs swimming with mystery and power.

"I-I love you."