Brilliancy [Black Butler]

『5. His Guests, Odd』

                『5. His Guests, Odd』

        This is completely tedious. If this head of Funtom Companies, all around respected, higher up than I in the social status area, and not to mention posh looking Earl was going to give me a job, the least he could do was make it thought consuming! As one could clearly tell, Alice's thoughts were not of too clean quality. In fact, she was streaming channels of vulgarities as she paced around on the front lawn to retrieve the guests from their carriages.

        After he'd banished her to play watch dog, all she'd done was stare at the gnarled hemlock tree a few feet away. Watching a squirrel crawl up a tree and a blue jay flutter across the blank grey looking sky wasn't what she called fun and adventure. Alice had learned when she was a tot that nature activities were not her ideal way of life. Her mother had dispersed that when she was younger, about the age of five, Nathaniel Hall had taken his small daughter, Alice, out for a hike. He had told his daughter about the beautiful streams flowing down the same path it had for centuries, the large trees giving them a lush verdant shield from the scorching sun, and the frolicking wild life from average galloping does to the large grizzly bears.

        About two feet into the cramped forest, she threw a tantrum, demanding to be escorted back home immediately. The centipede crawling on the ground by her shoes scared the living daylights out of her. As stated before, Alice had changed a lot from when she was a small girl. For one, her height, weight, and appearance changed. After the accident, or what Alice considered assassination, with her parents she'd long stopped brushing her hair one hundred strokes or singing to the birds hopping across branches. By then, she was being lectured on the difference between the Enfield Mk1 and a Whitworth Rifle.

        Staring out into the distance, she saw a barn like building which must be the Phantomhive stables. In her two days before starting the case in that dark alleyway, she'd gathered up information on the Phantomhives from Ash, who was taking it from the Queen herself. All-in-all, it must've gotten warped along the way because Alice had been told that his aunt was Angelina Dalles which was impossible, as far as she knew, Angelina was dead. She'd died the very same night as her parents. The same way as well, she'd lost many souls that day.

        Although Angelina Dalles being related to Ciel Phantomhive was not impossible, it was not at all true that she was alive to this day. There was no explanation, no goodbyes, she was just dead in a pit of red flames that licked up her body slowly, eating her up like a child gobbling up a forbidden sweet.

        Sitting on the cold cement steps, Alice peered up into the sky. It was a dark charcoal color, like the easels on display during the arts fair last September, the sky looked congested with grey clouds, all backed up like a sink drain or a toilet. She didn't see a single bird venture out into the sky, as if they were afraid. Instead the blue jays and whippoorwills and the robins fluttered from branch to branch underneath the tree, too scared to take risks. They all pecked at leaves, trying to fish out some safe food and minded their business not wondering what was above them, so empty and so vast. Though the sun was seen slightly, painting the dark grey with a speck of light grey and shining proudly even behind the blanket the sky gave it.

        The grass in front of the manor was not as well kept as the garden, or so Alice heard. Visiting the maze of lush leaves was on her to-do list, but she had not gotten around to it. The grass in front of the manor, however, was not a sight that many traveled to see. It was in patches speckled about the light brown dirt, although short monkey grass it did sway in the slight breeze that mussed Alice's hair.

        Suddenly a loud thumping, much like footsteps, reverberated across the damp forest from last night's drizzle. It sounded like horse hooves. This realization made the maid jump up with happiness. She was done sitting out here, but she really didn't want to go back in the manor with the Earl either.