"Good night, milord." A hand smoothed down the duvet he was under, to assure him of her presence. It didn't linger long, departing as quickly as it came. Few clicks of heels sounded.

Lights extinguished, blanketing all in the choking darkness.

He hadn't meant to.

He swore he hadn't meant to.

His hand darted out from underneath the cover and grasped a tail of her jacket. His words fled without his permission, "Please don't leave me." He wetted his chapped lips, not registering the slight stings from small cuts he gained from what seemed like a lifetime ago.

The clicks stopped, and the presence closed in, "Not quite an order I'd expect from you—wasn't I a monster to you?" Her voice was silk, slick with ill amusement.

He wasn't deaf to laughter hidden within. Jerking his hand back as if it was burnt, he buried himself deeper in his bed, "Don't leave me." He repeated, almost begging.

"I'll never understand children." She sighed—he wasn't sure if she was annoyed. His…monster, the one who he summoned from the depth of Hell with his desperation and cursing the God, was hard to read still. She danced between amusement, goodnaturedness, professional blandness, and slight annoyances, all seemingly within a matter of seconds.

Demons are supposed to be strange, he decided—in the same way they find humans strange.

"You weren't the one who branded me like a pig." He murmured.

She returned to the spot she was in a moment before. Intrigued, she cast her eyes upon the mound—he could feel the weights of them upon his little, abused body, "Ah, but I branded you, didn't I? Right on that pretty eye of yours." The last word was tinged oddly—something he flinched at.

"Yes, but with my permission. It was an exchange, not a mark of ownership." He agreed, curling in his body tighter, "Everything you do and did, I asked for. You weren't the one who casted Hell upon me and all that I ever loved." He gripped the sheet in between his fingers and gritted his teeth, "They did, and I will find them and make them suffer!"

A soft laugh echoed across the pitch-black room, "I will not argue, for your words are true. Humans are more of a monster than we are."

"Yes." He answered, perhaps too quickly for his liking, agreeing easily with her words, "…I have to become a monster to gain my vengeance." His body deflated, guilt swept through his every vein.

He strangled a shriek before it ran away in between his teeth, when the darkness pulsed—like a heartbeat, and roars of rain came after, "I certainly hoped that isn't doubt I hear, milord." She purred.

Ice crept over his skin with fear, when he stared at a gristly claw, blackened skin and rotten, phasing through his flimsy cloth barrier and dug deep into his mattress. He couldn't move, staring wide-eyed at that appendage, when her hissing voice rolled over him like a crashing tide, "I'd hate to have to end our fun so soon, so quickly, milord."

Somehow a burst of anger ripped throughout every fiber of his being, breaking him out of his fear-ridden trance, "No!" He barked, slamming down the white safety down at his waist. Despite the fear hammering in his chest, he glared at the beastly silhouette before his mismatched eyes, one of which had cut through the darkness with a dim glow.

He was bold.

He was almost sure he wouldn't live to see the sun.

Instead, she laughed and shifted away from him, her form normalizing and the deafening drums of rain quietened, "Good! Remember, I will not hesitate. The moment you waver…"

"I'll die. I know." He sneered and his palms ached.

"Heh! Then, we have nothing to worry about, milord." There was a click, "Are you quite positive you wanted me to stay?"

Propping back down on his pillow he took a moment and stared above—he couldn't see much of anything in the dark he knew, but he liked to imagine that he was memorizing the pattern on the fabric canopy. His eyes slid closed, and nodded just once, "Yes."

Defeated, he sighed, "At least until I've fallen asleep."

"We'll have a long day tomorrow." He can hear her red lips curling upward, "So, shall I sing you a lullaby?"

She sounded…deceitful, but was there anyone else he could truly trust? Even he was uncertain of the old steward, and had refused to see any other. There was no desire to humiliate himself in front of his remaining family, in such a pathetic state. The only things he had left were his pride and simmering rage.

"Am I a child, Kagome?" It was odd to say her name—a name he thought was from a mere fairytale. It also felt right, to call her that too. He could've pick any name out of thousands, and he chose the one from a story he knew by heart.

"Kagome, Kagome,
that little bird in the cage,
When, oh when will you come out...?"

Even thinking a single line of it gave him goosebumps.

There was a drawn-out hum, "That's a strange question, milord, to ask me." Her silhouette shifted, "I see everyone as a child in my eyes—but if you intended your question in a human logic, then yes, you're still a child."

"…As long as I can suffer no nightmare, do what you like." He turned away and buried himself in his blanket. He curled into a ball and hid himself from the world he once thought was perfect.

Kagome chuckled, "It's merely meant to help you sleep. I have no other intentions for offering such." There was a beat of pause, and an inhale of breath.

His eyes went wide, at the melodic voice swam into his ears—it was so sweet, free of imperfection, that it almost felt wrong.

"Eheu fugaces, Postume, Postume,
labuntur anni nec pietas moram
rugis et instanti senectae
adferet indomitaeque morti…"

It sounded like Heaven.

The weight in his eyelids grew heavy.

He knew it wasn't.

When her song ended, he was asleep. Kagome analyzed his peaceful expression and trailed a finger across his bruised skin. Her smile sharpened, "Sweet dreams, Master Ciel."

Words: 1050

A/N: The one Kagome sang is from DARGAARD - Thy Fleeing Time.

The rewrite of my old story, Troublesome, is finally here. Originally, I intended it to be a fully fledged fic, lengthwise, but…I don't have enough energy for these and I wanted to save some for Consequences.

I rewrote this story so many times. Some of the concepts I originally had in Troublesome were quite nice, but poorly executed. So, I started everything from scratch and worldbuilt quite a bit to make lady butlers possible in that era, researching a good bit about the suffrage movement.

I'll admit: I do not have enough smarts to incorporate politics, so I'll likely skim over it rather than detailing it. Anyway, enough of my rambling. This story, similar to Cracked Porcelain, will be kept within a certain word limit, no less than 1k word but no more than 2k-3k per chapter, and I will attempt to update every other week.

Bonus: I will attempt to do an illustration for each chapter of Ouroboros! You can see them in my art blog in tumblr (belle-drawthings in tumblr) under Ouroboros tag and can also be seen in its' a03 counterpart! This is an attempt to force myself to draw more often, with less time spent.

Thanks for reading and please do review!