Pere Lachaise.

Ciel had always wanted to see the great Paris cemetery. Sebastian had promised to take him one day, and introduce him to some of the people of his past whom he'd known, loved, hated and contracted with, tell the boy a few tales, indulge in a little out-dated gossip. Only there had never been time for fun when the boy was still acting as Victoria's watchdog and seeking his revenge. But all that had come to a sudden end seven months ago.

And now...well. Now, they had all the time in the world, thanks to the meddling Trancy and his demon entourage.

And here they were at last, together in Paris, inside its most famous of cemeteries, wandering up and down the little cobbled lanes lined in sarcophagi and marble mausoleums, visiting the cats, viewing the beautiful marble monuments of sad angels, sweet lambs and soulful mourners, reading the plaques and admiring the beautiful little city of the dead. Only now Sebastian was in no fit mood for the telling of tales of times gone by or peoples of the past.

No.

The demon butler's mind was full of festering resentment over the curse of a contract with no end and no reward. It was squeezing the will to go on right out of him. Ciel could see it in his dull eyes the colour of old, dried blood.

Was he, Ciel Phantomhive, really such a terrible person to be stuck with for eternity? Ciel knew he had some annoying habits, but so did the butler! Ciel knew he wasn't the easiest person to live with, but Sebastian had always seemed keen for it, seemed to relish the challenge. Well. Apparently Ciel had grievously misread his butler. Without his soul it seemed there was nothing about the young noble the demon wanted.

He was only ever interested in me as a meal.

This dreadful truth, known intellectually, but never so keenly felt until he'd had his face rubbed in it these past months, so crushed the boy it cast him into the deepest depression he'd ever known. The former young earl Ciel Phantomhive, robbed of his purpose in life and severed from every last shred of safety and security he'd ever known, no longer had the heart to demand or even ask things of the demon who was now forever chained to him. The boy had become mute to all intents and purposes, only answering when Sebastian asked things of him—which happened hardly ever. Whole weeks went by with not a word spoken nor a glance exchanged between them.

The boy actually appeared to have lost height rather than grown, his posture was so downtrodden. The butler noted it briefly as they'd checked into their current hotel but as such thoughts no longer held significance in his mind, it had left as easily as it entered.

As for Ciel he'd given up watching the demon for some sign of softening and now only ever had eyes for his own toes and the ground they walked. It helped him avoid the pangs he felt when Sebastian inadvertently swam into his field of vision. The ground was a safer subject to focus on. Though he wished he were under it and thus well out of it. If that were true, his sadness would end and Sebastian's as well. The demon would be free of his unfair burden because that's all I am to him now, nothing more than a worthless burden. Ciel knew Sebastian regarded him as the living embodiment of his own exclusive Tartarus, the demons' Hell, because the demon had been at pains to tell him so, as often as he could.

After all the misery, shame and physical torments it had seen fit to heap on the young earl, it seemed as though Life had finally found the ideal weapon to utterly shatter the earl of his outsized pride: the one creature he valued above all others, the one for whom he would gladly have died, saw him as his own customised torment, and hated him for it with every particle of his essence.

Sebastian wished him out of existence. And honestly? Ciel was inclined to agree.

And because the butler was so turned in on his own selfish misery, so silently furious and poisonously resentful, the boy was too consumed with sadness to enjoy anything about their Paris visit and the sky wept tears for what might have been.

In consequence, instead of a pleasant little interlude, a chance to behave like a couple of tourists together in the great city of lights, they were slogging through the rain, drowned and sodden, plodding down the marble lanes like a pair of lost mourners, downcast and full of sullen tension.

Their visit to Pere Lachaise would not be a good memory for either of them. For one of them, however, it would hold a bitter lesson that however bad things are, they are always capable of getting worse.

After trudging along in bitter silence for about an hour, the boy summoned up the courage to speak. He touched his companion's arm.

"May I ask you something, Sebastian?"

"You just did."

"What?" Silence. Then a soft "oh."

Uncharacteristically, that seemed enough to quell the boy. Like a ship in the Doldrums the wind fell out of his sails. He looked back down a moment then returned to silently splashing down the cobbled lanes, drooping as though his soul were made of lead.

—his soul, oh yes. If only...

When several moments went by with no question forthcoming, the butler stopped, let go a huge, exasperated sigh and asked, "What was it you wanted." He was careful to keep his tone as flat as possible. No anger, no enthusiasm. Just words, grudgingly given.

"I just wondered whether there were any demons buried here."

"What?"

They both turned and stared at each other. The boy blushed and crossed his arms over his chest defensively, stepping back a little and looking away. He could smell the humiliation on its way. What's wrong with me? Should've kept my mouth shut.

"I thought—I was just wondering if— is it possible for a demon to die and if so, were there any buried here?" he crept backwards to sit on one of the raised memorial tombs.

The butler just stood staring at him with hard, narrowed eyes, aghast at the boys cheek—or was it truly ignorance? Surely he'd taught him better than this—but then he recalled their months of bitter silence and he was no longer sure. He decided to go with cheek.

"Wishing me dead then, are you." he spat between gritted teeth.

"What?" The boy sounded shocked. "No, Seb— no!" Sebastian glanced at him curiously only to see a familiar face looking back up at him with an expression he'd never seen on the boy's face before. On anyone else the butler would've called it horror, maybe even heartbreak. The demon made a rude noise of disbelief and tore his eyes away. This certainly wasn't his ruthless, defiant little contractor any more. He never knew what to expect of the worthless little creature any more.

If possible, the boy's voice was even smaller than the nearly inaudible mumblings he'd been given to lately and it trembled with emotion.

Strange, the demon thought, then dis,issed the questions that arose.

"I never said, I never anything like, like— Sebastian, don't put words in my mouth." The butler's face twisted into an ugly sneer but his eyes refused to meet the boy's again. "I would never wish something like..." the boy's voice failed him as he thought to himself ah, but you do, don't you Sebastian? You think that way about me all the time, now. I'm just an unwanted weight 'round your neck. How nice if I were dead and gone, eh? You'd be so relieved.

Time passed. The boy continued to sit on the tomb in the rain, thinking sad thoughts and letting the rain hide his tears. Getting chilled and becoming ill were no longer possibilities, so the butler never offered to share his umbrella —though he did give the boy his handkerchief. He could see snot escaping his nose in a stream running. Anyway, if the boy wanted to get himself drenched, the butler reasoned, even sit out here until he grew moss it wasn't his affair, not any longer.

"But it is possible, isn't it? For a demon to die, I mean? Or not?"

The butler made an inelegant noise and stared down the shiny-wet cobbled lane to where a couple of lovers were clinging to one another under a large umbrella and giggling. The pair stopped to kiss and he turned the other way.

It was clear to Sebastian his hatred of the boy was returned to him seven-fold. "I am practically immune to true death due to my age. You, however, are at risk for several gruesome fates." His eyes slid to the side to observe the effect of his words. "Without me to guard you you'd quickly meet your end," he added, radiating deep joy at the evil implications, hoping to get some kind of rise out of the child. Fear would be delightful, but he'd settle for a little run of the mill anxiety. But that seemed more than the child was capable now.

Instead of fear or even nervousness, the boy seemed genuinely, if morbidly, Interested. "Go on then, tell me."

"You are new and still quite tender and weak, a helpless infant, really, so any demon could come along and simply tear you to pieces for sport." It wasn't often Sebastian looked every inch what he truly was but on saying these words a savage aura seemed to boil off him in a way that left the boy with no doubt which demon was doing the rending for sport in the butler's fevered imagination.

"And would I really die from that? Wouldn't I be stuck forever in pieces without the strength to pull myself together?"

"Well, that is a possibility," the older demon admitted, grinning, his eyes alight. 'You probably wouldn't have to worry about it though, because anyone who bothered to expend the effort to tear you into bite sized pieces would doubtless eat you. No point in wasting fresh, young meat, after all." Again with the humourless laughter and the sly looks, gauging the reaction.

The reaction was non-existent, barring a thoughtful look.

"That wouldn't be very pleasant." The boy said softly as he sat kicking his heels against the marble like any little boy. A sharp word from the one who would have to get the scuffs out of those boots made him stop.

"Then again," Sebastian resumed, "there are always plenty of shinigami roaming around. They'd be only too happy to dispatch a demon, even a little imp like you." Again nothing. The butler was becoming bored with baiting the child and annoyed at his repeated failure. And I used to be so good at it, too. "Or I suppose you could just starve yourself or bleed until your body shuts down. Young as you are, I doubt it would take much," he finished, turning completely away.

The boy continued to sit, his hair dark and plastered to his head, listlessly staring into the middle distance, thinking—or perhaps only staring. The butler could no longer tell and frankly didn't care either way— so he told himself.

"I'm going back to the hotel. I assume you know the way." the butler waited a beat for a response. The boy merely looked into his eyes sadly. The butler quickly looked away, turned on his heel and left him sitting on the tomb in the rain and gathering twilight.

Much later, in the wee hours of the morning, the little one found his way back to the hotel room. Sebastian had long since gone to bed, treating himself to a bit of luscious sleep since the hotel bed was especially nice with a feather tick, fluffy down comforter and lovely thick, well-broken-in linen sheets. He'd just stripped off his wet things, hung them up near the fire and slipped between the sheets just as he was.

The boy followed Sebastian's lead, stripping off his rings and eye patch, leaving them on the table by the bed and then hanging his clothing over the other chair by the fire.

Sebastian lay with his back to the room, quite aware of the boy's every movement but consciously ignoring him as the boy puttered about. Finally he came to the bedside, toweling his hair but otherwise quite bare. He could feel the little one standing there a long time. At one point he felt a shy hand, still cold from the early spring rain, touch his bare shoulder, caress it, then reach up and card through his hair.

When he could stand it no longer, the butler turned with a jerk and eyed the naked boy resting his hips against the bedside.

"Well?"

"Didn't mean to wake you."

"Well I'm awake now, so what is it," he said running his eyes over the pale little body standing beside him. The boy reached out his hand again and traced the marking on the back of the man's hand, lovingly tracing out its lines, a sad little smile trembling on his lips. Sebastian drew the hand back beneath his pillow, putting an end to the gentle touch.

"What," he said again, a little gentler this time.

"What would you do if ...you know, if you were free? Is there somewhere special you would go?"

The man's face curdled. "You woke me up for that?" He turned back to the wall again. Angry. Intent on regaining sleep. "What is the point in dwelling on the impossible? I have no wish to add to my torment. Get into bed."

The boy circled the bed and stood facing the man again. "I wondered if you might like to sleep with me."

"I sleep with you every night."

The boy gathered his courage as he looked into the dark red eyes now glaring back at him so coldly. "I meant the other kind of 'sleep with me,' I thought it might… make you less angry."

Of course Sebastian understood perfectly. He'd dreamed of little else the entire time he'd served the little one as butler and personal valet, caressing and ministering to that pristine, perfect little body day in and day out, dress and undress, bathe and dry, comb and cut, brush and primp. Biding his time, waiting, hoping to be there when the boy was finally old enough to want or at least be physically able to bear such intimacies. But he wasn't interested in making things easier for the child at the moment. What he wanted was for the proud Phantomhive to suffer some of the same indignities he'd suffered.

Ciel had finally taken a risk and shown weakness to him. What sort of demon would he be if he did not pounce on it and use it for torture?

"Why the hell would I want to fuck some snivelling infant? I'd sooner sodomise a dog in the street. Now get into the damned bed and shut up. I want to go back to sleep and you're keeping me awake." The butler turned his back and drew the comforter over his head, drowning out the sounds of the room, the child and the steadily thrumming rain.

The boy stood by the bed a little longer. "There isn't anything about me you want any more is there Sebastian."

The butler was rather impressed the child had finally dared to reveal his soft underbelly to him this way, but still he refused to be moved by it. He too could be stubborn and proud.

'I'm sorry you didn't get what you worked so hard for. I really did want you to have it. You truly deserved it. You were—." Once more the little hand touched him lightly, this time on the hip. The butler stayed still and silent. The hand trailed across his back and ruffled through his hair again. Then it was gone. After a few moments the butler heard bare feet lightly padding away, headed for the bathroom. He soon fell back to sleep to the sounds of a bath being drawn.

His eyes slowly opened on the thin blue light of dawn softly illuminating the room. He stretched out a hand for the head of his small bed mate, intent on making up a little for the spleen he'd vented the night before. He reached and reached and found himself looking at the boy's undimpled pillow and his own hand, pale and curved with its dark, horn-like nails resting on the soft white pillow. He had slept well enough, but woke to a vague sense of something elemental having shifted, something out of kilter, and at first he thought it was simply the fact the boy was not in his usual spot beside him. His stomach clenched with a nebulous apprehension until he reminded himself he no longer cared whether the boy was safe or not, got adequate rest or not, lived or—.

He blinked a few times, rubbed a bleary eye and kept on looking. Gradually one source of wrongness dawned on him: he was looking at his left hand and the back of it was unmarked. Then another: the scent of blood. He sat up suddenly and took a hard look. The contract mark was there, but so faint one would've needed to know its exact form and former location to even begin to look for it. A ghost of it remained, a pale greenish tint, deep in his flesh. He recalled then his dreams had been full of creatures savaging that hand, someone impaling it, flames flaring up out of nowhere to scorch it...why had none of that wakened him? That's right: I'm supposed to no longer care whether the boy is safe or not...

His eyes raked the room. The last thing he remembered was sounds of the boy drawing a bath. He was a demon now, he couldn't drown, even if he fell asleep in the water. What the hell had gone wrong now? The demon leaped out of the bed and strode into the bathroom, following the alarming scent.

The tub was empty —that is, it was drained of water, though someone was still in it. Inside, curled up in a tiny knot of knees and elbows was the boy, his head half wrapped in some dark cloth, his eyes wide, dull and tacky-looking, his skin so pale he seemed translucent, his lips the colour of blue clay. He'd got into the butler's luggage and was clutching his uniform coat to his narrow chest, his face was partly buried in the lining.

The butler pulled the coat away and as he did something fell clattering out of the folds into the echoing tub: a straight razor he'd never seen before, brand new by the look of it, its blade blooded.

He sat the boy up and several rivulets of blood mixed with residual bath water dribbled down the drain. Sebastian could see numerous savage cuts in the boy's flesh at his wrists and thigh, across his bicep, over his skull and straight down through his contract eye, and the worst one, deep across the throat, ear to ear. Each clearly aimed at maximum bloodletting. It would be a comforting fiction to believe someone else had somehow got into the room and done this thing to him but the butler knew better. If anywhere the finger of guilt was pointing squarely at himself.

He found the note after he'd picked up the naked boy, put him into the bed and spent some time closing and healing the awful gashes. It was folded very small and held tightly in one of the boy's hands. It read:

I want you to be happy again, Sebastian. I want to be free as well: free of seeing you suffering because of me. I miss those annoying little grins of yours and sly smirks. It hurts to think I'll never see another.

I was so looking forward to being the one who got to spend forever by your side, but it's no good if you aren't happy to be there as well. So this should make things right again, for both of us.

Finish the job if necessary. My last order to you is 'Win your freedom; break the damnable con—

Quickly he crushed the letter before he could read that last word, refusing the command. He strode back into the sitting room and threw it into the remnants of the fire.

Just then the boy, now on the bed, shuddered and drew in a shattered groan. The demon grabbed the boy and held him close to his cheek, feeling for more breaths. He touched his ear to the boy's chest and heard a single, stumbling heartbeat. The boy's eyes did not blink or move, but there was just the tiniest spark of life still lingering in the little body. He flexed the little torso, manipulating the boy's diaphragm, forcing it to draw in breath. Perhaps if he coddled and kindled it, he could coax the spark back to life again.

"I don't want freedom, Ciel, not if it means being without you. I lied, little one, I lied with my silence. I lied to myself. Can you hear me, Ciel? There is nothing about you I do not want, nothing," and he kissed the clay-coloured lips, then massaged the little chest some more, and listened to the stumbling heart and the slow, listless breaths. He gathered the flaccid child tight to his breast and whispered "Live, Ciel, please live. I deserve your punishment, but not like this, please."

He buried his face in the crook of the boy's neck, inhaling the delicious scent, warming the chilled flesh against his own, licking the terrible wounds that had yet to heal, compressing tand flexing he little chest, encouraging the breath and the heart to keep going, trying to bring the boy back to consciousness. The thought flitted through his mind that he wished he'd taken the boy up on his offer last night, at least he'd have had that memory to cherish while waiting for his unlikely miracle.

Perhaps if I hurry and feed him...

...and so they returned to the great Paris cemetery, to wander, sit and wait for the unwary soul to stumble into the company of the dangerously handsome man in black with his entourage of cats, a faded tattoo on his hand, tenderly cradling the beautiful sleeping boy in the richly decorated, dark blue coat.

And there they wander to this day perhaps: the boy who dreamlessly sleeps, and the man who cradles and guards and waits, remembering and repenting and longing for a miracle while feeding the boy the souls of the unwary in the great cemetery of Pere Lachaise.