How to Make a Sinner Sleep

62 | clipped; to be imperfect

The Organizer was the first to speak, voice obscured and different. Their appearance had altered once again, a second shade swirling in their eyes, and their hair was difficult to discern by the hat that tipped forward.

"Careful, dragon." warned the man without trickery or tease. "It's only easy to hold back, to pretend to be what you're not when you're wearing a different skin."

Noah felt fire burning in his blood, the rush to his head. Desires, selfish thoughts, irritation and bitterness fueled his veins, a constant pulse that thrummed underneath his thickened layer of skin.

The ink that covered his hands had spread further, a glisten of scales beginning to form that ran to the sharpened tips of his nails.

It'd been so long since he allowed pieces of himself, of the dragon blood that ran inside him, to show that he couldn't control it. The chaos, the madness that he was given at birth.

Dragons, who knew their strength and worth by instinct, powered by wants and needs—living selfishly, living free. 

But that freedom came with solitude.

Noah's shoulders fell and rose as he closed his eyes, feeling the warm skin of the man in his arms, obediently leaning back without struggling. Kaden, who listened quietly and closed his eyes without even being certain that it was Noah.

"Noah Bellamy." warned the Organizer once again quietly.

There was a hint of concern.

Noah steadied his breaths, pupils expanding and shrinking. In control, calm, patient? Noah Bellamy could never be any of those things—he could only pretend.

It was false, the way he earnestly listened and waited, because really, how could he be patient when it took every fiber of his being to remain calm? He knew it best; that he was the furthest thing from the label of 'perfect' easily stamped to his name.

"Noah," Kaden opened his mouth to speak, feeling the stirrings of the dragon at his back, realizing that something was odd. "Should I assume, based off their words, that you're in a half-human, half-dragon state?"

Noah didn't respond verbally, instead leaning his head closer and nodding.

"And you don't want me to see?"

Hesitation, rare from the man that was proud and confident, and another nod.

"Why not?"

There was no response.

Kaden fell silent, eyes still closed and blocked by the heavy hand that rested upon them. It was strange, to think of Noah's weakness, that he could possibly possess any in the slightest.

It was strange, that Noah refused to reveal his appearance, as if it were something to be ashamed about, when the appearance of a dragon could never be scorned or ridiculed.

And once again, Kaden realized, that he really didn't understand the dragon called Noah Bellamy in the slightest.

Noah shuffled behind him, muttering softly. "You put me on a pedestal, Chauvet. How could I let you see me, when all you do is look as if I'm the protagonist of a story, and not as if I'm real?"

Kaden's eyes snapped open as he attempted to spin his head around, only to find himself fixed in place. The fairy and the Organizer stared at him in confusion, not hearing the whispered conversation.

He attempted to move, grabbing Noah's wrist.

"Bellamy, what are you talking—"

"And that I'm as ugly inside as any others. That I would clip your wings and bind you to me if that would keep you flying to your death."