I got more reviews this time than for the previous chapters and that made me really happy. As a thanks I decided to upload the next chapter a little faster :) Hope you enjoy it!

It took Allen another day to get on his feet again. He was still looking rather pale, but the deep exhaustion had left his eyes. If Lavi had to believe Neah then Allen's quick recovery was all because of the leeches, but he had a feeling the ghost was just saying that to prove his point. He hadn't mentioned their conversation about learning black magic again, and for now, Lavi still wasn't sure what he needed to say if he would either.

Allen was quieter than ever during breakfast. Lavi blamed the state of his health, but at the same time it made him wonder if his host would be ready yet to answer some questions. Allen couldn't possibly expect from him that he wouldn't want to know what happened that night.

They had soon given up on the polite table setting. Speaking from one head of the table to the next felt like shouting. So at some point Lavi had taken place at the side of the table, next to Allen, which had immediately taken away the awkward edge of the conversation.

But now he ate in silence, enjoying the rich flavors in Jerry's cooking until Allen lowered his knife and fork and stared into the distance.

For a moment Lavi just observed him, wondering if he should ask if his host was alright, but then Allen finally spoke up. His voice was so soft that it was hard to catch all the words.

"I'm sure you have a lot of questions."

Lavi sighed. "You bet."

The boy finally turned his face towards him and smiled tiredly. "I guess it's about time I explain a little more to you. But do you mind if I do it after our meal?"

"Yeah, sure."

Allen seemed reassured at those words and picked up eating again, devouring almost double as much as he already had that day.

That's how he ended up following his host through the mansion after breakfast. At first he thought they were going to find a better place to talk, but soon enough it became clear that Allen was simply roaming the corridors at random, like he couldn't decide where he wanted to go.

"Al, are you okay?"

The boy turned around, looking almost surprised at the question. "Y… Yeah, sure."

He looked around like he was just realizing he was standing in a corridor, then frowned. "Where are we again?"

Seriously? "Allen, you're not lost in your own house, are you?"

Immediately a deep red blush rose to his host's cheeks. "O… Of course not. I just didn't really pay attention where I was going and I usually don't really come in this wing of the mansion."

So basically he was lost. "How come?"

Allen shrugged his shoulders. "With a mansion as big as this one you don't use all the space when you're on your own. The rooms all look the same anyway, so usually I just stay around the middle part. I don't even know why Neah needed such a big place with just a handful of staff."

"So, why would you go here right now?"

If possible the usually pale cheeks colored even darker. "I don't know. I wasn't really watching where I was going." He sighed. "Sorry, I'm really out of it."

Seeing the defeated expression on his cute host's face made Lavi feel sorry for him. He laid a hand on Allen's shoulder. "It's okay. It happens to everyone. Shall we go back now then?"

He earned a grateful expression that soon turned to slight desperation again.

"But how? As I said, I'm not all that familiar with this part… and I'm not going to ask Neah. He'll just laugh his ass off and leave us here."

Yeah, Lavi could see that happening. He agreed on the no-Neah part. "We could retrace our steps. I remember all the turns we took. It might take a bit longer than needed, but it's the least risky."

Silver eyes widened. "You remember all that?"

Lavi grinned. "Definitely. You can trust on Lavi Bookman to remember all useless trivial things for you. Once in a while it can be really useful to have a good memory."

Allen smiled in excitement. "Alright!" He turned around and stuck out his hand. "Lead the way, master Bookman."

It took a while, but after many turns they arrived back at the main hall, where Allen sighed tiredly and sunk down on top of the staircase facing the front door.

"I'm beat. I haven't walked around this much ever since Neah made me look for a moondripsnake during my apprenticeship."

Lavi chuckled as he sat down next to him. "Sounds like someone should exercise more often."

"Don't want to hear that from a bookworm."

They laughed softly.

"So, are you ready to hear about my stupid past?" Suddenly the happy cinders in the silver eyes died, making space for nostalgia and pain.

"If you're ready to tell me."

Allen sighed and dropped his face on his knees. "Yeah, I guess I need to tell someone sometime… It's not like concealing it will make it disappear."

"Yeah, that's the hard thing about pasts," Lavi agreed.

"It all started right here." Allen lifted his head and stared at the front door with eyes clouded with memories. "In this house Neah taught me black magic and in this house I made the biggest mistake in my entire life…" There was a little silence as the boy seemed to overthink his words, then he started at the beginning: "When I was still just a child, Mana adopted me, but you already know that."

Lavi nodded.

"I have many good memories of him. He took real good care of me. Together with my brother and him I was really happy. I loved him and I couldn't picture a life without him.
Mana and Neah, however, had kind of a tense relationship. Neah had lived here in the outskirts for years and didn't dare to come close except for special occasions.
One of those occasions we got into a conversation about magic. He found out how interested I was and when he taught me a little trick for fun he discovered I had great talent for it, something which is really rare these days. So he spoke with Mana and after long discussions and many arrangements I was finally allowed to spend a few weeks at the mansion.
Learning magic from Neah grew on me, so those few weeks turned into more, until I spent half of my time here, instead of home. I simply couldn't choose between here and living with Mana."

Allen took a deep shaky breath, but his voice was still steady when he continued.

"Then Neah died. Cross took over as a teacher, but it wasn't the same. It felt like the most important part was missing. As if that wasn't enough already, a few weeks later Mana followed his brother."

Allen was clenching his hands so tightly around each other that Lavi could see his knuckles turn white. But he still didn't stop talking.

"With Mana lost I felt like I had lost home. The two places I used to live at, both seemed empty and meaningless without my father and uncle. I continued to learn magic here, but I felt like part of me had been taken away. I was so desperate, that when I found that spell I couldn't stop myself."

He fell silent and hid his face behind his hands. For a moment nobody spoke but Lavi was starting to get an idea where Allen's story was going.

"I wanted to bring him back," the boy whispered. "I just wanted that good life back. But what I brought into this world wasn't him." He lowered his hands, but wouldn't meet Lavi's eyes. "What I summoned was a demon, simply feeding on his soul to stay in this world. As soon as the creature saw me, it cursed me. It cut my left eye and imprisoned me in this house with the scar that remained. Then it left and I never came to see it again.
However, soon enough I got to hear the stories. That creature, calling itself Mana nevertheless, was doing deep dark things. Apparently he has his own black magic, because he started bringing back the dead. He raised corpses by putting lower demons into them, creating monsters that looked like humans, but carried out his will and killed other humans to get stronger. It's using Mana's appearance and Mana's soul to spread tragedy and in the meanwhile I'm stuck here. I can't do anything to stop it."

"Then Marie was…?"

"Yes, he was one of the corpses Mana raised. The letter Kanda brought didn't lie. Marie did die that day. The one at the door trying to kill Miranda was nothing more than his shell possessed by a demon."

"I see." Lavi stared at the front door, letting the information sink in. "I'm sorry you had to go through all that."

"It's all my own stupid fault."

He couldn't stand that dull, pained look in the silver eyes anymore. In an impulse he laid his arm over the boy's shoulders and pulled him a bit closer. "Everyone makes mistakes sometimes. It doesn't help to beat yourself up for them. It's much more useful to look for a way to fix and prevent them. "

Finally Allen would meet his eyes. "You don't understand, Lavi. That's what I've been doing the past thirty years. I've been searching for a solution for ages, but there just doesn't seem to be one anywhere." His face contorted in pain. "I think I did something I can't fix ever again. Mana knows that. That's why he cursed me to stay here and never age. He knows I'll just be stuck here forever, looking for a solution that doesn't exist and drowning in the guilt of what I've done."

"You mean that creature did that," Lavi corrected him.

"Yeah, whatever." Allen's reply was dull, like he didn't actually believe it and suddenly Lavi was starting to realize that the boy was actually thinking Mana might have taken part in the curse as well, even if he was possessed.

"Allen, if Mana loved you-"

"He won't anymore now." Allen stood up, shaking off Lavi's hand, and descended the stairs. "You know the story now. So if you'd excuse me, I need some time for myself."

Without waiting for a reply, his host vanished behind a door, leaving Lavi on the stairs with a uncomfortable feeling.

He'd never really felt much at others' stories at all. Usually they were just information for him. He'd feel for them for a moment and then move on with his life because it had nothing to do with him. But for some reason seeing Allen in so much pain hurt. He wished he could do something about it, but at the same time he knew that after all this, the answer wouldn't be that easy.