How to Make a Sinner Sleep - Chapter 61: Chapter 61

There was a loud voice that Kaden couldn't hear or understand, but thought sounded annoying, even if he couldn't discern their tone. Shouting and yelling angrily, Kaden clicked his tongue, rousing his escaping mind.
The pair of pale green eyes cracked open a sliver, dazed.
Somebody was standing there—not the illusionary fairy, but a person, solid and real. Hands fisted into the flowing cloth, they yanked the fairy away without holding back.
Kaden staggered, but refused to fall to the ground.
To admit to weakness before an enemy and a stranger would be foolish. Collapsing could mean death. He couldn't die yet. He couldn't.
The human—Kaden assumed to be—hurried over, a hat far too large sitting sideways on their head, a pair of familiar eyes set in an unfamiliar face. Rounded in surprise, worry filling their gaze.
"What's wrong with you?" hissed the man. "It's common knowledge to fight back! A faerie can't have that much claim over you, even if it's that sort of faerie unless you let them!"
They scolded him until they were breathless, panting.
Kaden's vision finally cleared, and he jerked away from their hold. The corners of his lips dipped into a suspicious scowl. "Who are you to tell me so?"
The man straightened, dressed in a suit that resembled a magician's wear, hair combed back and conflict sewn across their face. A second later, they smoothened out their emotions and relaxed.
It happened so naturally, Kaden almost wondered if he'd imagined the worry, the evident concern. And perhaps he did, with his delusions always surrounding.
One day, would he stop knowing whether something was real or fake?
The man stretched his arms wide, a playful tilt to his lips. "See, it wouldn't do any good for my reputation if a person I welcomed to my meetings died so easily. I'm rather fond of you all, and you're rather necessary for my gossip-seeking ears."
Kaden swept the bead of blood that trickled down his neck, distantly looking at the red smear on his fingertips. "Sir Organizer," he drawled, voice hoarse. "To what do I owe the pleasure?"
'Why are you here?' was the question unasked.
"I am here and there, and nowhere, and everywhere. I am wherever I wish to be, and I am whoever I wish to become." The man tipped his hat. "Do you owe me a favour now, considering I saved your life?"
"I'll grant the world a favour by reaping your life."
"Ah, I'm pained by your cruelty."
"What are you doing here?"
The man's lip quirked. "I'd assumed that was a question you weren't going to ask."
Kaden lifted his chin, eyes narrowed into slits. "And I'd assumed that it was a question you'd answer, whether I asked it or not. I don't need your vague nonsense."
Then, recalling the faerie, he spun around. There, sitting cross-legged and cheerfully braiding their long hair into delicate, careful braids, smiled the illusion. Noticing Kaden's stare, their smile widened.
"I apologize," their voice sang, a violent jingle in his ears. "I was a little hungry."
The Organizer nodded in understanding. "No worries, we all become beasts when hungry. Nothing to apologize for, only a fool would allow himself to be so defenseless."
The faerie sighed, resting their cheek against their palm. "Indeed, it startled me. Who can resist a prey that doesn't run away?"
"Precisely. Therefore, even if you'd eaten him, you needn't apologize. A fairy as ethereal as you should never feel sorry."
The fairy giggled, loving the praise.
Kaden listened to the exchange, somewhat dumbfounded, feeling his fingers twitch into a fist ready to beat somebody.
The Organizer caught his eye, and shrugged helplessly. "It's true, I rarely lie to those I like." He clapped, and suddenly he was standing behind Kaden, smiling. He leaned by Kaden's ear, lowering his voice. "Why don't I gift you some information, an apology for startling you?"
Kaden's eyebrows knitted together, but he remained still, glancing backwards as a sharp laugh escaped him. "And what information could you give that would interest me? That I couldn't find myself?"
"Confident, aren't you?"
"As one must be to survive."
"Bizarre, when you don't act like one wanting to survive."
Kaden paused, and then reached a gloved hand out—still smeared by blood. He dragged his fingers against the other's jaw, watching red smear against the skin. His hand tensed, but with the cover of his gloves, he could endure it.
The Organizer flinched back, startled.
Kaden sneered and wiped his gloves against his clothes as if having touched something disgusting, scrunching his nose.
He pointed at the smear of crimson. "You're not a faerie—but in these lands, only guests can answer. What are you? Even if you change your disguise, will the blood wash away before I can rip off the skin you're wearing?"
The Organizer looked bewildered and slightly disgusted as well. "...really, you're quite the nasty fellow are you? Rubbing your bodily fluids on me."
"...speak properly, why don't you?"
The fairy sitting on the ground snickered loudly, but made it somehow sound elegant and silky. "If he'll give you information as an apology, dear, why don't I as well?"
The white and gold fabric pooled around their slender figure, translucent.
Before Kaden could agree or reject the offer, the fairy continued in an airy tone. "A Blessed—as you call them. A human one, it appears—hm," They tilted their nose to the air, curious. "Their blessing is faint, perhaps fading or overused? I do wonder."
A hungry glint had begun to crowd their voice, and although their image was blurred, Kaden thought they might be drooling.
"A tragic fate—to devote yourself to the one you should despise most! Ah, your fate would taste divine."
The Organizer took a step back, but there was no fear in his stare. "I'm afraid, beautiful fairy, that I personally couldn't forgive your hunger if you took a bite out of me."
The fairy wilted, sulking. "Despite assuring me that it was alright?"
An amused chuckle sounded. "I'm afraid that what I say, and what one thinks I said, don't always quite line up."
"I suppose." hummed the fairy, returning to their braids sorrowfully.
"Now, for my information, far more helpful than snippets into my supposedly tragic fate would be." The man scratched his chin, distorting the shape slightly before pushing it back into position. "You're here to observe and explore, correct, oh student of the Academy?"
Kaden simply stared, encouraging the man to continue.
And continue he did.
"The fae, fairies, faeries, whichever it is you wish to refer them as—all of the above. They've been interfering with humans recently, interacting with those in smaller towns."
Kaden frowned. "We're here to keep an eye out for cases of kidnapped fairies. Why would they help humans, when it's been humans killing them lately?"
"See, I'm sure you've heard whispers about the spread of illnesses across town, missing children, dying humans. They pray for a miracle, and it's when they have nothing else that they pray to the otherworldly."
"Fairies wouldn't help without cause. I'm not that naive."
"Prejudice, Mr. Fox, is what that is. There are humans that would help other races, as their are fairies that would do so too."
Kaden stared. "I'll apologize, then."
"Oh, no need, you're actually right."
"It's nothing cruel, the 'reason' you're imagining. It's a small group that are curious in mingling with other species. Perhaps that hope that by helping, they will fall into humans' good graces. That it will end the kidnapping caused by malice, discrimination or reasons we cannot fathom."
"You don't know?"
"Even with access to thousands of people's intelligence, there will still be an abundant lack of information."
Kaden wouldn't deny that, but he couldn't help but feel that the man was hiding something, a thing more grave than his identity under the skins he changed out of. An obscure man, one who couldn't be underestimated.
"By telling me this, do you intend for me to explore?"
"I don't know, are you sparked with curiosity? I can't intend for you to do anything you have no interest in. I'm afraid I have no present plans on placing a curse of obedience."
The last words struck Kaden sharply, and irritation swirled in the pale green eyes, a hint of bloody darkness. "If you did have such plans—"
"He wouldn't be able to cast such a curse, alas." mourned the fairy, forgotten for a moment but still there, listening like a spectator.
"Unfortunately, dear," Their body swayed, watching Kaden with interest. "The curses that chase you are too terrible for a half-hearted one to overwrite them. One that binds more than a single life."
Kaden peered down at the fairy darkly, gritting his teeth. He closed his eyes, a flutter of a second, before his lips drew into a bemused smile. "You wouldn't happen to have a solution, would you?"
"Would you accept my solution, should I have one? Despite appearing set in following your fateful path of destruction?"
Their body dragged along the floor, silky fabric flowing behind them like a river made of white. Stretching closer with curved, concaved eyes, their hands moved as if drawn to the hidden curse marked on Kaden's skin.
Kaden blinked, and then his body was being pulled backwards—a gloved hand, warm and defined fingers pressing over his eyes.
Kaden was dragged backwards, and he felt no fear.
A hot breath fell by his ear, evident that the person had rushed over without rest. They breathed heavily, leaning by him. "Apologies, Chauvet. Please keep your eyes shut."
There the man stood, a singular bat-like wing protruding from the left of his back, wide and white, tainted with ink that crept up its edges as if being polluted. The wing curved around the person they held, protectively wrapping around.
His white-black hair mused and in disarray, while a twisted horn protruded from his head. Through his ragged breaths, there was a sharpness to his teeth and a red gleam to his dark eyes.
The fairy appeared delighted. "You may wear a human guise, but you and he are not the same. Do you hide his gaze in fear of your own appearance?"
Noah's entire body radiated an air of gloominess, a dangerous swirl that covered every line that made his body. He'd been in a hurry, a warning in his intuition, searching for a fool that wasn't in their rooms, nor seen by anybody else.
He'd run into Niklas who was flirting—or what he insisted to be a casual conversation—with a beautiful fairy, and hadn't seen Kaden slip away.
Noah had turned around and took to the winding hallways, past the breathing oaken walls that pulsed with life. In his hurry, a startling bad feeling wedged in his throat, a few of his bloodline traits appeared.
Stares followed after his movements, the classmates he passed that went wide-eyed in either admiration or fear.
Dragons, by nature, had an air that made others cower in fear.
It wasn't a disposition Noah had ever desired.
There was a reason that they chose isolation, the safety of solitude and the treasures they held dear, locked in a home that was closed to all strangers. A reason, so ingrained into their nature, it wasn't one they could choose not to feel.
He'd turned, left and right and then left again, to no avail. Not a single glimpse of pink hair in sight.
Kaden Chauvet, always running away. Would it take chains and a lock to bind that human to one location, to keep him safe and—
And that wouldn't be happiness.
Noah's fingers curled inward, frustrated and disgusted at his own thoughts. He closed his eyes, organizing his thoughts and emotions as they lowered to a more normal calmness.
The next time he turned the corner, he found the man he was looking for.
And the fairy sprawled on the ground, made of illusions, as their translucent hand floated closer, as if to steal something away.
Noah's breath caught in his throat, abyssal gaze observing every detail of the scene—every detail of Kaden's bleeding leg, the slice that ran along his neck, the paleness to his face.
A back that wasn't frail or weak—Kaden Chauvet was not weak. But it was in the way that the shoulders slightly hunched, barely noticeable under the facade of confidence, that made one inexplicably distressed.
The injuries that if inquired on would be responded with a casual and stubborn, "I'm fine. It's nothing."
Noah's breath steadied. Before moving, he should correct his appearance, hide away the things that made him inhumane, abnormal even in the Academy made of creatures.
And suddenly, the dragon felt as if the person before him could disappear at any moment, a dead man buried in a grave that nobody knew of.
Without mind to his own appearance, he ran.