Could I please request platonic!motherly reader with ciel? The only competent worker besides the butler, smart/diligent/hard working but still pleasant to be around, but slowly she has worked her way into the earls heart as someone he ‘begrudgingly’ cares about. She sings beautifully and is given permission to sing when there are no guests, some nights she can do a private show for everyone in the manor 💜 I can practically hear the acoustics 👌 I CAN SEE FINNY VIBIN ALONG ~
One night she is secretly tasked by Sebastian to come to the lords room as he’s having a terrible night terror, she stands off to the side of the lump of sobbing covers and starts singing A mhaigdean Bhan Uasal (from Brave yes, BUT GOD ITS BEAUTIFUL) and is able to bring him down, maybe even feel like for just a second that his mom was back? 😭 plz and Ty
first of all I had to zoom to this request because holy shit how do you know what kinds of things I want to write EVEN BEFORE I DO?? ARE U A WIZARD BESTIE????
but uh DANG I could see Finny vibing!! and all the others! tho Sebby vibes............... quietly.......... but he still do vibe........................
ANYWAY I HAVE NO TEARS LEFT PLEASE LET ME HUG THIS LIL MAN I AM RUINED
DISCLAIMER: This piece is accompanied by a few sections of lyrics from the song “A Mhaighdean Bhàn Uasal” from Disney’s Brave! I don’t own the song, don’t claim to, and am not profiting off this piece at all.
You’ve always thought that even though he’s no longer a child, your young master deserves some kind of maternal presence.
It’s difficult as you don’t want to be presumptive, but… he seems to have accepted you as that presence. At least in a way. Your singing brightens the household, so much so that once in a while he actually takes a break simply in order to have a cup of tea and listen to you.
SEBASTIAN keeps you well under his thumb, as well, though he doesn’t have to watch you as closely as he does the other servants. You do your job dutifully and with almost as much perfection as the butler himself. All else aside, you think he’s proud of you. Whatever else is true, he seems to enjoy your serenades just as much as everyone else.
The rest of the staff handle combat quite easily; you’ve seen them do that. They protect the earl from every outside threat which comes for him. Sometimes you don’t know how you fit with the rest of them, because you’re not a fighter.
Then comes the night when you realize that you’re not here to protect CIEL from intruders ― you’re here to protect him from the parts of his mind that try to swallow him whole.
It starts when you open your eyes to find Sebastian at your bedside, with a careful hand on your shoulder. All it takes is for him to whisper, “Apologies, my lady, but the young master has requested your presence,” for you to be hurrying to your feet and slipping on a robe so that you’re dressed in more than your nightgown as you follow him.
It’s never happened before. You’ve never been woken in the early hours of the morning and summoned to Ciel’s room, and for what reason? It scares you a bit, concerned that something must be wrong.
When you enter the room, it becomes clear that your worries are correct. The sheets are a mess, except for the comforter which is bunched up at the foot of the bed… presumably, that’s the image of your master wrapped up in it. He’s still short and slight even as an adult, and it appears he’s attempting to make himself as small as possible at the moment.
Worse yet, you realize that you haven’t ever heard the sound of him sobbing until now. You’ve been with him for years, and this is the first time you’ve heard your master cry.
There he is, the Earl of Phantomhive, curled up under his bedclothes, hiding and wailing like a hurt child.
In a way, you suppose that’s what he’s been ever since you met him, and that’s what he’s remained, because he’s found nothing to help him heal.
Your gaze shifts briefly to Sebastian, seized by the urge to grab his arms in fear. You’ve never seen Ciel quite like this before. Does Sebastian really think you know what to do? Shouldn’t you be asking him?
“He refuses anything I offer.” The butler’s voice is kept low as he gives you the only explanation he can. “I admit I told a little white lie in saying that he requested you, my lady, and I sincerely apologize for that… but… I’m at a loss. My thought was that you might be able to calm him. Perhaps with a song?”
Then you look back to Ciel. The young man is trembling beneath the comforter, and you can see his hands clutching, gripping, unsure whether to pull it closer or throw it off entirely. It looks, however, like he’s terrified that something awful will happen if he leaves his hiding place.
You don’t know everything about what’s happened to your poor master. What you do know is that he’s been through hell and came back standing as tall as he possibly could.
But you don’t think it made him stronger. It was himself who made him stronger. You think what he’s been through just hurt.
Does Sebastian really think a simple lullaby can be of any comfort?
Still, you take a few steps, and tentatively kneel at the side of the bed, near the end where Ciel is sat. “My lord,” you say softly. Just to get his attention. Just to draw his focus to you, so that maybe his mind will throw away the focus he has on everything which has hurt him. “I’m here. Can you hear me?”
You can see his eyes from inside the comforter. One of them glows. The one he always covers, burning like some pink flame in the night, with a pattern you can’t make out. Now’s not the time to ask, because there’s terror in them both, and he seems to be looking through you. “I… I can… who are you? I don’t…”
“It’s just me. It’s (Name).” Part of you thinks it should hurt that he doesn’t recognize you. It’s a tiny part, though. He’s caught somewhere between a memory and the present; you can’t blame him for being confused. “It’s only Sebastian and I here. It’s alright.”
You should have expected, perhaps, that when you reached your hand toward him, he would smack it away as he does. The fear reignites, its message clear ― even though he knows who you are, he’s afraid of being hurt. “Don’t touch me!” Twin rivers make their way down his face, dripping down onto the bed, his eyes pleading with you.
“… Don’t…” His voice comes out quieter after that. As if he didn’t truly mean to snap at you, but the thought of touch right now is unbearable. “Please… don’t touch me…”
Instantly your hands are held up, away from him, showing that you aren’t going to try that again. “I won’t, I won’t. I promise.”
He’s crying and breathing so hard, you’re anxious he might work himself into an asthma attack. So you perch one hand on the board at the end of the bed, and set the other on the mattress in front of him. “Ciel…” Maybe if you speak to him as if he’s your son instead of your master. That’s how you think of him. That might be what he needs at the moment. “May I sing to you?”
A series of shuddering breaths makes his frame shake. That you’ve offered seems to make more tears fall. “W… would you…?”
You begin to hum quietly, a sound which could almost be mistaken for a violin playing the melody of your lullaby. So many of them you’ve collected over the years, but this one special for the simple fact that you speak your mother tongue within it.
“A naoidhean bhig, cluinn mo ghuth,”
you start; a flawless soprano that some people have likened to a goddess or a faerie. It floats high above the rest of the world and acts as a gossamer blanket. A shield unlike the one Sebastian offers. Much gentler, see-through, delicate as silk and strong as steel.
“Mise ri d’ thaobh, Ó mhaighdean bhàn
ar rìbhinn òg, fàs a’s faic
do thìr, dìleas fhéin…”
The song and your voice wrap him up in security. Not so loose that he doesn’t feel safe, not so tight that he feels restricted. It settles over him like a dusting of snow, and it brings back better memories.
Memories of sitting by the fireplace at night, then being carried back to his room. A kiss on his forehead. A pair of arms encircling him within a larger bed than his own. A hand rubbing up and down his back to ease his coughing. A warm blanket when cold winter winds would rattle the windows.
Things which have been lost.
Things which he could have again, if only he would reach out for them.
Things which existed in his mother, and which also exist in you.
“A ghrian a's a ghealach, stiùir sinn
gu uair ar cliù 's ar glòir
naoidhean bhig, ar rìbhinn òg
mhaighdean uasal bhàn.”
It’s like you’re watching him come back to life, back into himself, back into the present. He remembers where he is and who he is and what’s going on.
You meet his eyes, and you can see it ― he knows he’s safe.
Thin fingers creep out from within the comforter… setting on top of where yours are resting. He holds your hand with as much strength as he can muster right now, as if he thinks you might vanish if he holds too tightly.
As soon as you give him a tender smile, he shifts wholly. His body slips off of the bed, bringing the comforter with him as he pushes down into your embrace. He’s still unsteady, thready breaths puffing against your neck as you pull him in.
Your arms hold him gingerly; aware that the hurt child inside him is screaming to you for comfort. You take all of it, the anger and the pain underneath it, and you let it all collapse against you.
Whatever Ciel might ever admit to, he needs you. He needs to be taken care of. He can’t do it all on his own like he’s been trying to ever since you met him.
If what he needs in this moment is for you to hold every single part of him that aches, you’ll do it.
When he opens his mouth, too exhausted to do anything else, it’s a whispered few notes that come out.
“Naoidhean bhig, ar rìbhinn òg…”
he echoes you tiredly. His voice just barely the rasp of a song, with the fear not quite gone from his eyes, he lets them fall closed. At least trusting that even if he’s scared, you’re not going to let anything hurt him, even the ghosts of things which have already hurt him.
“Mhaighdean uasal bhàn,”
you finish, final breaths against the crown of his head.
Nothing can harm him.
Not as long as you’re here.
You won’t let it.
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