Work Text:
Memory fades, memory adjusts, memory conforms to what we think we remember.
[JOAN DIDION]
Lizzie sleeps for a few days.
At the end of the week, she pulls Mother into a lesson. Edward watches them both.
Ciel will send word soon.
This is a singular event, of course.
-
The room is not a chessboard.
She has memories of the drawing room being Aunt Rachel’s favorite room. For the light, she used to laugh with Mother. This is not an important memory.
Lizzie stands at the end of floor, closest to his chair. They watch Sebastian test the rapier. Swish. Flick. She can feel Ciel watching her.
“It’s of the finest make,” he tells her, finally.
Her eyes narrow. Swish. Flick. The hilt is too heavy, she thinks. The gold makes it obnoxiously ornate; Sebastian’s fingers seem to fit through anyway, unnoticed even with the slightest of pressure.
Her fingers pull at her gloves. Today they are lace. She feels the threads gather underneath her nails.
“Are you – ” she drawls, hiding under her confusion “ – trying to show off?”
Ciel crosses his legs at the knee.
“Sebastian,” he says.
The butler pauses. Swish. The rapier flips and he grips it by the blade, arm outstretched. Lizzie peels off her gloves.
“Ciel,” she murmurs, and she is neither wistful nor surprise. Her fingers catch at the gold working, flushed with Sebastian’s hand once rested. The weight of the rapier is unbalanced and impractical and honestly, honestly, she thinks, but knows better because Ciel has always been Ciel. There is always a reason.
She does not have bloodlust. Her arm extends forward and the blade cuts into the air. Swish. Her free hand pulls at the pins in her hair. Flick. Her curls come loose. Mother would be amused, she thinks. Father not so much; Edward, however, is always angry enough for all of them.
But now she is thinking about her secret, her incomplete secret as Ciel has not seen all of her like this nor will she consider showing him too much. She loves him, but she does not trust him and she wonders if this, this is supposed to be some sort of final declaration between them both.
“If I asked,” says the boy, “would you fight him?” The tie at his eye is coming loose. “For me,” he finishes.
She blinks. Her arm remains extended, midair.
“Sebastian?” she asks.
“Yes.” Ciel pauses. His butler shifts to stand in front of her. His eyes are sharp.
Lizzie tilts her head to the side. “Blind loyalty,” she murmurs. “Is that what you’re asking me, Ciel?”
“You are my fiancée, Elizabeth.” There is nothing but Mother’s lessons in her head. Know your opponent. Be patient with your opponent. It’s almost cruel when he says it and still, it surprises her less and less. After all, there are few secrets now between the two of them – in a pool of plenty.
“If I deemed it necessary,” she tells him, and draws back the blade. Sebastian’s mouth cues into a smirk. She studies him. “But I do not take kindly to the use of my particular set of skills – ”
“Talents,” Sebastian interjects, and Ciel snorts. She rolls her eyes at the impropriety. They both mock her.
“They aren’t for your use,” she finishes.
She is steel because of Mother. She can no longer go back to the preference and safety of her aunt’s parting words. And if it were meant to be a secret, there is more of her that doesn’t want to go back.
Her hair still curls at her face, tucked into her chin. Her gaze wanders to Sebastian again, her mouth tucking into a sliver of amusement.
To be fair, none of this is predictable. Ciel has always transcended into some sort of break for her: she does not think of opponents or footwork, or honestly, Ed get up when it is just the two of them dressed in white, flanked by Mother and her rules and her bright, bright ferocity.
“Sebastian,” Ciel says.
The butler hesitates. Or considers. Lizzie will later assume the later.
But he lunges.
Lizzie does not wear her heart on the sleeve of her dress.
She is an odd girl. It breathes in her throat.
She blocks both of Sebastian’s lunges. He drops back to consider. She does not give him the time and flips her blade, butting the heavy hilt of Ciel’s rapier into his belly. He draws back and skids, stumbling.
“I do not want to do this,” she says.
Sebastian’s eyes are bright. His body crouches into space. The wood of the floor catches into his boots.
“You’re just as bad as he is,” she tells him, softer. Sebastian does smile. His teeth are bright. “And you – ” her voice turns to Ciel and she stretches into blocking a hit from Sebastian again. “You are the absolute worst.”
It doesn’t mean that she doesn’t love him any less. She is sixteen. In a year, she will be due to be seventeen and they will ask her things about wedding dates and the simple, slight, and demure ring that is closed over her finger. She imagines there will be moments to consider too – perhaps another, perhaps losing Ciel, perhaps Mother and Father finally telling her the words she knows that are coming: consider yourself, consider your duty.
But this does not mean she loves him any less.
Sebastian is holding back. He moves to mold to her movements. He will not hurt her unless Ciel deems it wise; she understands this much about the two of them. She is holding back just as much. Block. Swish. Flick. It’s all too much like a lesson. Lizzie, darling, please repeat your steps again.
Then she decides to end it. It’s too easy to mistake a step. Sebastian turns the butt of his hilt into her belly. She makes a soft sound. Her mouth turns into an oval of surprise and Ciel is standing from his chair. Her head is spinning and Sebastian loops an arm around her waist, catching her as she falls.
It all feels vague and familiar. She smells the sea. She feels Ed’s fingers in her hair, touching the crown of her forehead and maybe, it’s really because she hasn’t forgiven herself for Campania.
Her fingers fist into Sebastian’s jacket. Her head feels heavy. She blinks and then her vision clears. She remains nestled in the butler’s arm.
“You’re angry with me,” Ciel murmurs.
The lines in his face become curious – she will not call them soft.
“Not everything is about you, Ciel Phantomhive,” she shoots back, flushed warm with embarrassment, and for a moment, it splits and they are almost children again, too small, too outside.
“Yes,” he agrees. His knuckles graze her chin. His fingers move to her hair. He hesitates too and then it’s his mouth, cool, over her forehead. He is wistful. She swallows to remain unfazed. “I will try again,” he says to Sebastian.
The butler sighs. “It is the fourth prototype, my lord,” he replies. It feels like an indulgence. It sounds like a gift.
“A prototype?” she inquires, small.
Nothing is an answer. She is more than aware that she doesn’t answer Ciel, or that he doesn’t answer her. He doesn’t not loosen is grip around her arm, nor does Sebastian; instead they are both pushing her to her feet, smoothing over wrinkles and stray hairs. The rapier lies alone, untouched on the ground, paired with the much larger partner of Sebastian’s.
She does not allow herself to participate. It wasn’t her place before. It will not be her place now. The lesson still lives here.
Her dress is torn.