"Go on," she urged. "Lie to me by the moonlight. Do a fabulous story." - F. Scott Fitzgerald, The Offshore Pirate
1891 descended on them like a windfall at midnight, with gold soaked stars and endless parties held one after the other in gilded, triumphant succession. There was nothing to suggest, or even hint, at modesty with the thick perfume of French champagne, Galimard fragrance soaked in pretension, and the heavy apple blossom scent of dewy young ladies ready to make their societal debut. On May 5, 1891, the honor was bestowed upon a Lady Elizabeth Ethel Cordelia Midford, daughter to the marquess of Scotney, and a whirlwind of the happiest kind, with the sort of charm that might have entertained the likes of Oscar Wilde and impressed the American intellectual Henry James.
The night had begun in perfect harmony, with the soft tranquility of evening falling like a cobalt cascade upon the Midford estate, illuminated by chandelier light tinted gold and filled with the merry chatter of convivial guests, each of national importance. Yet none, people recognized, were so important as that of the Queen's Watchdog, whose reclusive reputation now made him the premier guest of honor at all social occasions. It was not that he was a wonderful party guest but his mysterious veneer of diamond and ermine enabled him to relinquish all faults in the eyes of the ton and society welcomed the last Phantomhive with macabre, senseless joy. They complimented one another for having introduced themselves to him before falling short of conversation and departing in a hasty, broken manner that entertained the earl's vicious sense of humor.
He was now in his fifteenth year and beautifully handsome. Young lord Phantomhive embodied the loneliness of the moon, dressed as he was, in dark blue silks and shades of singular melancholy that inspired a sort of bitter heartache all women welcomed and all men observed.
His presence at this debutante ball caused ripples of gossip to echo throughout the upper echelon, though everyone knew the earl cared very little for their opinion and merely passed by the aged dowager duchesses and shallow daughters of privilege with a cool sense of boredom. There was only one girl he could ever see himself in conversation with and even she impressed upon him a distant, pale affection that seemed to hover about the edges of his heart.
With almost disinterested disdain, the earl made his way towards the marble barristers, half-shadowed by the sable night, while his butler hovered a few feet behind him, indulging in the senses and flavors of England's nobility.
The earl, impatient by nature, scanned the sea of faces for his Lady Elizabeth and regretted, with faint animosity, at not having asked Nina Hopkins for the color his fiancée's gown. He had been in the most intemperate mood two months prior, struggling to capture a criminal whose activities were disrupting the fragile peace between Austria-Hungary and that small, sovereign nation of Serbia. It had taken Ciel diplomacy, discretion, and a ruthless dose of blackmail to burn the telegrams that would have no doubt sparked war between these unevenly matched powers and dragged, Ciel shrewdly noted, Britain, France, and all the rest of the world into the ensuing conflict.
Yet now the queen seemed to have granted her Watchdog a brief reprieve, taking to Parliament and testimony while Charles Grey and Charles Phipps all but informed Ciel he would be without commission for some time. Instead of dissolution and despotism, the earl had thrown himself into the investigation of his corruption, determined to find the monsters who still plagued his dreams. But when the Lady Elizabeth turned up at his doorstep, dressed in a teal gown and with her hair unbound, he felt a tender sort of affection that forced him stop work and speak with her about the gardens.
Ciel was not intentionally cruel towards this golden haired nymph but the dangers of the underworld could not be ignored and she was so pure and kind and good. He had already sold his soul to the devil but to leave someone like Elizabeth scarred and disheartened was too wicked a sin for even he to commit. She represented the best of humanity and he would endeavor to keep that smile on her face for as long as he possibly could. It was dangerous to see her for too long a time, for she was the like the sun itself.
"Young master." The butler commented from within the shadows, carnelian eyes glowing bright red as he smirked into the imperceptible darkness. "I believe the lady has made her debut."
The earl ignored his servant's words and instead focused his gaze on the opposite staircase—a grand spiraling rung of white marble decorated with pillars of gold alongside the Midford shield of arms. That, then, was where he saw her.
Men of poetry would have described this moment in terms more beautiful—and sentimental—than Ciel would care for. He himself was a student of realism; of Hobbes and Machiavelli and, sometimes, Alighieri. There was no true beauty in this world because the sins of man could easily be brought to the forefront. No love was everlasting because selfish desire often took hold of even the best of people.
Yet in this one sterling moment of illusion and clarity, Ciel relinquished his firm grasp on the Leviathan and saw for himself a woman of otherworldly and ethereal loveliness. Dressed as she was in a calla lily gown of dark emerald, her golden hair swept up while curls of shimmering sunlight cascaded down her back.
Around her throat, a rope of diamonds glittered.
It was a strange, unintentional sight that brought Ciel to a place he could not quite name. There was the familiar longing of childhood, yes, but within the bounds of time something else clicked—like the final wheel in a timepiece—and he felt a torrent of unfamiliar adulation that brought back memories of yesterday.
24 hours prior:
"Tell me, do you think it very terrible that I am so truly happy at the moment?"
Ciel glanced at Lizzy, dressed like an amaranth rose—a spring blossom unburdened by woe.
He felt surprised by the smile that came to his lips, for this sensation of contented mirth was not something the earl was used to, not at all. "Why do you ask, Lizzy?" He inquires, more gentle with her than he was with anyone else. "I have heard happiness praised by many a scholar."
"Yes but they also praise goodness and virtue. And my happiness conflicts with goodness and virtue."
He frowns. "How could you possibly? You are the very embodiment of those two things." The words are unintentional but still, it is not praise he is giving—merely a truth Ciel has never dared speak out loud.
Elizabeth, always so exuberant and bold, shies away from his sentiments. "I am very happy you are here with me." She hesitates. "I am very happy you have not gone away." Lizzy, almost fearing his retribution, looks away and fiddles with the irises growing by the lily pond's stony side.
Yet Ciel, with his contemplative silence, desired—with every fiber of his being—to deserve her as he was.
Gently, and with a strange uncertainty he had not felt since he was nine years old and innocently in love, the sapphire earl takes her hand but his courage—an element of darkness—falters. He focuses on the gauzy blossom decorating her dress as words of painful sincerity fall from his lips, the honey of a tainted spring. "With you," Ciel manages, voice soft and unsure, "who could not be happy?"
Ciel has always defined himself in various terms—some tangible, others less so—but the limitation of knowledge now impedes him from identifying this emotion blooming within his chest. It is an unearthly sensation and instills in him a strange longing for more time.
He takes a breath, subtle and thin, and leaves his dark alcove while the demon remains there, watching and waiting.
The earl navigates the tedious crowd until he sees the luminous girl in emerald. She is conversing with another woman of little importance and, without meaning to, he takes Elizabeth by the hand and finds that he cannot let go.
"Lady Elizabeth." He murmurs, feeling breathless, while she, after meeting his gaze, smiles so brilliantly that Ciel cannot help but despair and revel in two conflicting emotions. The agony of realization and the soft happiness of renewed affection.
"Ciel!" She beams, quickly curtseying to her awestruck companion and, once she does, Ciel is suddenly seized by a moment of possessive obsession. Without hesitation or calculation, he pulls her away until they stand alone by the tall glass doors that lead out to the Midford gardens.
Elizabeth has always been the sun, warm and all encompassing, but here and now, illuminated by the pearlescent moon, she looks a pillar of grace and desire—and he has never loved her more.
"I hope I haven't kept you waiting." She says, suddenly shy. "Mother was very insistent that I look my best tonight."
"You've dashed the hopes of every young man in this room. I think the marchioness has done a remarkable job."
She laughs. "The world is changed, then, if you and mother now see eye to eye."
The world is changed because of you. The curves of your lips rewrite history. He thinks this silently but dares not say it out loud.
"Your optimism is unfailing."
"Oh, when one lives this long—"
"You're seventeen Elizabeth." Ciel says, half-exasperated and half-amused. "There is nothing so old about seventeen."
"I think it's a terribly long time. Add eight more years and it'll be a quarter of a century. Could you imagine?"
"You've always had a better imagination than I."
"That is because you have always loved numbers, logic, and Euclid."
"And you have always been fond of Vittoria Colonna and Metastasio."
"That was before I could pronounce his name correctly! Do you remember my utter humiliation when I thought it pronounced pistachio?"
Ciel laughs, surprised and so very fond of everything about her.
"You gave me a pistachio plant the next week." Lizzy remembers. "I wouldn't speak to you for three days afterwards."
"I could never understand why you were so embarrassed."
She gives him a fierce look awash with affection. "The duke of Westminster's son was there. Mother intended for me to marry him."
"I highly doubt you would want to be the niece to the Viscount Druitt. A criminal record would be a terrible blemish on your societal standing."
Lizzy glances out the window and then back at the gilded ballroom across from them. "I don't think I would mind very much." She pauses, almost afraid to continue on. "I think it would be very nice to simply be happy."
The honest purity of her words, poignant yet unsure, holds Ciel in momentary stasis until a resolve that is both reluctant and insistent takes him over.
He moves a step back, bows, and offers her his ungloved hand. "My lady."
She curtseys, faint smile on her lips. "My lord."
"A stroll, perhaps? Through the gardens?" He wants to tell her many things—some too vile for speech—but tonight, Ciel decides, he will have but one inquiry for her—one he hopes will bring her much joy.
He has never desired marriage—knows he will not live long enough to truly be married—but tonight is an exception and Ciel thinks he might make many exceptions for Lizzy.
If only to see her happy.
**Title inspired by F. Scott Fitzgerald's short story, The Offshore Pirate.
- Galimard: references Jean de Galimard who, in 1747, founded the third oldest perfumery in the world.
- Alighieri refers to poet Dante Alighieri whose work, The Divine Comedy, might be something Ciel would enjoy. I posit that Ciel might have a love/hate relationship with this work—on one hand it satisfies his macabre craving for destruction and retribution but on the other hand, Dante is being guided through hell by Virgil (an angel) and motivated to continue his quest out of loyalty to Beatrice, his great love.
- "The world is changed because of you. The curves of your lips rewrite history." — modified quote from Oscar Wilde's The Picture of Dorian Gray.
- Euclid: a Greek mathematician often referred to as the father of geometry.
- Vittoria Colonna: a 16th century Italian noblewoman more known for her friendship with Michelangelo than her beautifully written poetry.
- Metastasio: an 18th century Italian poet and operatic composer best known for his satirical opera L'impresario delle Isole Canarie.
A/N: a short POV narrative that somehow turned into this. I dunno, it was fun to write!
(And I know Ciel was lot more sentimental here than he usually—or ever—is in canon but dammit, I feel like Lizzy needs some love, especially with these last few chapters! And this is actually fluffy! I very, very rarely write fluff. And this is just a pile of cotton candy.)