Author's Note: This weekend is 'finish all those long-abandoned fanfics on this account' weekend. Hurrah. Please don't hate me. I stopped reading Black Butler for a... long while... and should probably look into grabbing the next ten books or so because it really is quite awesome.

I found Grell waiting inside my room and hissed with irritation at the sight. One last thing to wrap up and I dearly wished it wasn't so. I would rather be done and gone with this entire affair. The reaper was seated cross-legged on my bed, gazing at me intently through his glasses as I shut the door behind me. For a long moment neither of us spoke, then I sighed heavily and eased myself across the room to a chair.

"They're in the underworld," I said, "The souls you're after. Lord Cruidin is a kelpie and he's drowned those people and taken their souls. I don't know how to get them back, I've played out all the cards I can-"

"Oh, a kelpie!" Grell exclaimed, falling back on the bed and throwing one arm over his eyes, "Oh, of course! I didn't think to see one so far from Ireland. Well, that simplifies things."

"I – pardon?"

He rolled so that he was sitting once more, facing me with his legs off the bed and his hands tucked primly in his lap.

"It merely changes our accounting is all. There will be a formal complaint lodged, of course, and the kelpies will ignore it like they've ignored all the others. After ninety days we write the souls off as a loss and the matter is done."

"Are you bloody serious?"

After everything, it felt like such a let-down, that the matter of missing souls could be resolved with... a few notations in a ledger. I felt worn thin, more so than anything else had done to me so far. To devils, us mortals were meals. To kelpies, we were sport. And to reapers – we were numbers in a book. I stood, suddenly angry.

"Get out," I said to Grell, "I don't want to see you again."

"What?" The reaper blinked at me.

"Just go!" I cried, yanking open the door to the hallway beyond, "Lest I throw you out the window again!"

"Fine, fine. I know what this is. Jealousy. Well, try as you might, Sebastian is mine."

And he bared his teeth at me with those last words before vanishing into the hallway. I slammed the door shut after him.

"You can have him," I hissed.

I slept until noon and I spent the rest of the day packing my things. I went about it slowly, for Sebastian had dropped by at one point to inform me that the matter between Ciel and Lord Cruidin was resolved and the Earl would be leaving by carriage the next morning. I was welcome to accompany them if I liked, for my presence was no longer required by the kelpie. He said all this with no inflection and I wondered if it would have been easier if he had. I wondered if he judged my actions in all this and if he found them wanting or not, or if he was simply indifferent – and I wondered which outcome would be more painful to bear.

I did not see Ron. I was told, by Ciel, that the selkie had departed early that morning to see that his affairs were quickly shut down and that I would probably not see him again.

When evening came and the sun set, I found myself walking that hateful path down through the yard towards the river. I knew what I would find there, but still I went, asking myself with each step why I was doing this to myself. Things had changed and I was no longer safe, not from Cruidin, and there was no guarantee of Sebastian to save me once again. I'd offered myself up in that bargain and when Lord Cruidin had lost to Sebastian, he had lost both his hold and his promise of protection over me. Sebastian cared nothing for it. His concern was only for Ciel and I was of little consequence.

This, I told myself. This, I did not believe. There was the remains of a mark on my hand.

So I went to the river. I found Lord Cruidin there, just as I knew I would, kneeling in the water with a still form in his arms, held tight to his chest. As I approached, he gently lay her back down into the water, so that she was hidden underneath the black surface. He stood, water trailing from his kilt down his legs, shimmering in the pale moonlight on his skin, turning it as silver as his hair. His eyes were dark as he looked at me. I said nothing, merely paused at the bank to remove my shoes and stockings, and then I hiked my skirts up to my knees and walked out into the water. I stopped a pace apart, close enough that he could stretch out a hand and touch me with his fingertips.

"I did not want to hurt either Ron or yourself," I said quietly, "but I have seen what Sebastian is capable of and I feared greatly for what would happen to Ron if he were discovered. I knew you could force his obedience and put a stop to this. Is that what happened?"

"It is," he replied softly, "I spoke with the Earl. He will report the entire affair closed to Her Majesty and I am once again in possession of the seal's skin, and it will remain this way indefinitely. I have compelled Ron to cease his interference in exchange for being left alone. The English Crown has no desire to antagonize the Irish demons when a – civil – solution is at hand."

The kelpie turned his head away from me and took a breath.

"You say you did not want to hurt anyone, mortal girl, but you did. Ron Ghlas Mor is denied the waters and it will be my hand that keeps him bereft of his home. And it is your hand that forced such an agreement."

"What was I to do? Let Sebastian figure it out on his own? He's a devil – how do you think he would have dealt with Ron?"

"I cannot say. But you made this bargain – not him. My hate is divided now."

He took a step closer. I flinched, despite my intentions, and looked away. I stared at the inky surface of the river and wondered at it, at the cold seeping into my bare legs even now. I wondered if Lord Cruidin's spell he had on those women he drowned let them die bereft of pain.

"I did what I thought best," I whispered and I raised my head to meet the eyes of the kelpie. We were a mere hands-width apart now. "That is why I came. God save me... I – I trust Sebastian. You've had me under your sway, you know what it looks like. Tell me-"

I faltered. He reached out a hand and cupped my chin with it. It was not a gentle gesture, his fingers were tight on my jaw and he turned my head up so that he might look down upon my face. I saw in his eyes many of the things I saw in Sebastian. Power. Cruelty. But the indifference was missing, this Irish demon had emotion and he had plenty of it. There was a fierce love for humanity there, a sort of love that I could not understand, as the hunter loved the deer even as it died under their shot. I had heard that the Irish were a wild, passionate race. Their demons were much the same.

"No," he said softly, "Your ties are of your own making. You can break them if you will."

His expression grew curious for a moment and with his other hand, he reached up and gently stroked my hair. The grip on my chin did not change, he was both cruel and gentle, a duality of nature. Then he leaned in, and I fell against him, my palms against his bare chest, and I allowed him to tilt my head back and kiss me. It was cold, slow, and deliberate. I tasted salt on his lips and his skin was cool underneath my fingertips. I could feel the beat of his heart as clearly as I felt the beat of my own. Then he withdrew and studied me for a moment. I did not try to draw away.

"Unseemly," he murmured, "Your morals have slipped somewhat."

"I think they slipped long ago when I started dealing with devils," I replied. He dropped his hands to my wrists and started to draw me out after him, deeper into the river. I balked. He raised his eyebrows in mock surprise.

"I thought you came here so I could kill you," he said reproachfully, "Or did I read your intention wrong?"

"I'm not under the devil's hold. My soul is still my own."

He'd spoken the secret of my heart. Of the two, I would rather belong to the Irish lord's underworld than the devil's. Another accounting error for the reapers was preferable to being a meal for Sebastian.

"I'm not giving you a choice, Bridget."

He pulled. I was caught off-balance and I fell into his waiting arms. He held me there, trapped in his grip like a bird, and I was frozen in terror. I had almost drowned, once before, and Sebastian had pulled me out. I could feel that again, the fire in my lungs, and it seized up my chest so that I could barely breath with the memory of it. The kelpie dropped his head to whisper in my ear and I felt his hair brush my face like seaweed.

"You have done harm to me and mine," he murmured, "You also have the mark of someone who has almost drowned once before on you. I will take that in repayment."

He dropped me into the river. I felt his hands on my wrists and then he was straddling me at the waist, pinning me to the bottom with his weight. I struggled, uselessly, my back against the stones and mud of the river floor. The water was so cold, sucking the life from my bones, and I felt my lungs begin to burn as my supply of air dwindled. I was blind in the darkness, aware only of the rushing of water in my ears, the weight upon my body, and his hands on my wrists. Then my lungs spasmed, I opened my mouth, and breathed in water.

It was like being burnt, but on the inside, an aching heat that suffused my chest. My mind cleared and I grew calm, suddenly bewildered. This was what it was like to die, then. Cruidin's grip relaxed and then vanished, his hands left my wrists and he stood, leaving me there underneath the water. The river sang in my eras and I found that I had exhaled and taken another breath and while the pain did not diminish, nor did I feel like darkness was overtaking me. I was simply existing there, at the base of the river, letting the overflow steal away what fear I had. I closed my eyes and remained where I was, breathing in and out, listening to the water. It felt like an eternity passed.

Only once the cold made itself known, my body shivering in protest, did I surface. I pushed off and found myself standing in waist-deep water, coughing and spitting out what water remained in my lungs. The pain remained, but it was a bit duller now, the sharpness bleeding away with each breath of air I took. Cruidin was walking away, out of the river. I watched him go, standing alone there in the darkness. He had taken my fear. I felt hollow somehow, and wondered what sort of debt that was. If it was truly debt fairly taken and not a gift of sorts, for a service rendered that he could not acknowledge in words. What would have happened, had I let things play out as they were?

Shivering, I slogged my way through the river to the bank. Lord Cruidin was gone by the time I reached it, the immortal pulling that trick they always seemed to do when they wanted to pass unseen by mortals. I was not alone, however. A butler was there to greet me, carrying a mantle which he handed to me and I greedily wrapped about myself. It did little to stop the shivering.

"You were there the entire time," I accused. Sebastian gave a slight nod. "And did nothing?"

"You seemed to have things well in hand," he replied, "Ciel is most frustrated with your involvement in this entire affair. I have reminded him that you were contracted fairly and performed your duties as required by your employer. If he wants your continuing loyalty he will have to do what everyone else does and buy it."

"He has some of my loyalty." We started walking back to the house.

"No," Sebastian corrected mildly, "I have it."

"Isn't that the same?"

And the devil paused and smiled into the night. I saw the glint of his red eyes, wild hunger and joy in their depths, and could not look away.

"No," he whispered, "It is not."

He quickened his pace and I remained there, watching. There would come a time, I knew, that this distinction would come into play, and for it, I would be damned – if I weren't damned already. My shivering ceased and I stood there motionless, unable to take my eyes away from the devil.