How to Make a Sinner Sleep

100 | flee; ancient regrets

Kaden Chauvet.

Five letters, seven letters. Twelve letters to make an identity, two words printed on paper in neat and bold strokes of ink. Noah gazed at the two words quietly and traced the name again, and again until ink bled onto the next page.

Nicola's slender fingers held a ceramic cup between trembling hands, slowly tightening her grip as she repeated in soft disbelief, "He's alive?"

"He's alive." nodded Niklas quietly, the four seated around a round table of a bustling cafe. The cafe that Noah always frequented, and had made a double amount of appearances after his previous ghost sighting.

He looked over at the counter, casually making eye contact with the young server, William, who beamed and waved enthusiastically. Noah nodded in return.

Holly shook her head, sitting crossed-legged on the seats as she rocked back slightly. "We saw it! It was awful, and all the blood, but we saw it. There's no doubt about it."

"What we saw was an illusion conjured by Kaden's blessing."

"Can he conjure things he hasn't seen? Those eyes, the warped space, that's all psychological images that appear in nightmares. But that scene? It was so realistic..."

"Of us four, he is most accustomed to death. I'm not sure if his blessing requires a vivid imagination, but he was never lacking in memory of bloody scenes," explained Niklas, staring at the leftover tea leaves at the bottom of his mug.

They cluttered together in a murky, unknown mess.

Holly shrunk back, hesitant. She nibbled her bottom lip, on the verge of speaking. Instead, she remained silent.

Nicola stared at the stack of papers placed in the center of them, a customary newspaper that the cafe provided. In her cherry gaze was the reflected profile, proud and beautiful, of the crown prince.

"The way to bring Kaden back." Her voice took an eerie softness. "Is it to kill Reed, to uncover his plans, or both?"

Holly slammed her hands on the table, a nail clipping from one finger, but she didn't flinch. Her chair harshly scraped against the ground and all gazes turned to her in surprise.

"Nicola, you can't talk about killing someday that easily. And he's the prince—soon to be King! That isn't... it isn't you!"

Nicola folded her hands together, steadiness in her expression. "I'm not speaking easily. But what I am and what I need to be are both the same. If killing the... Crown Prince must be done to save my friend, then I'll hold that blade myself."

Seeing Holly's horrified and despairing expression, her voice gentled. "I'm sorry, Holly. I know it's hard for you to hear."

Holly's breath became laboured, and her eyes flickered from each of her friends the past years as if seeing strangers. They were all willing to put everything on the table to save Kaden—but she never found an answer.

Holly was a child from a decent family, raised with love and affection. She'd witnessed an extent of violence on the streets, but it was always a faraway reality.

She was not Noah who had witnessed a dozen cruelties, nor Niklas that carried a secret relationship with Kaden. She was not Nicola, elegance scraped together from the dredges of the slums.

She was just herself, a woman with a curiosity for gossip, whose nose wrinkled and stomach flipped at the recent corpse sightings she investigated with Niklas.

Holly took a step back, her chair moving to the side. The woman had grieved for the friend she barely knew, but how could she determine his truth? The truth? She wanted to know more badly than any other, to trust him with full confidence.