It was hard to pretend to not notice a stare, especially when there were dozens, each filled with a different variant of negativity and all equally judging.

The minute Kaden stepped into the expansive classroom, standing at the door as he looked over the entire room flocked with students, gossiping and whispering, he felt it—

—the stares.

Although it wasn't something he wasn't accustomed to, he still felt each one digging into his skin, scratching the surface with no desire to see within. Stares, he found, were the living's favourite and most unreliable way of judging a person.

With every step up the stairs that ran along the divide between the rows, the students ushered a path for him, separating as if a single touch or glance from him would curse them indefinitely.

He was a little offended—he'd taken a shower and smoothened out the wrinkles of his uniform seamlessly out of habit.

"It's him!" One whispered.

Another one stared, wide-eyed. "Have you heard the latest rumours? He's here to kill. Do you see his eyes? It's like they're judging us!"

'You're the ones juging me,' Kaden protested silently, thinking of the irony.

A few of the whispers were more simple. "Trash...!"

Then a stranger one. "Isn't he pretty good eye-candy though?"

"Now that you say that..."

Kaden ignored them, taking a seat in the back row corner. The classmate that was sitting in the room looked up fearfully, and awkwardly grabbed his things before scrambling away. Honestly, it was more awkward to escape than to simply endure Kaden's presence.

Well, they had every right to be fearful—Kaden Chauvet was a murderer.

And he would likely continue to be.

The first class was language, followed by mathematics, and then combat. The teacher for this class was one he remembered particularly.

A man drowning in passion for words, taking meaning from the smallest of things. Somebody who once tried to reason with Kaden, and almost succeeded.

It was a story of failure that Kaden didn't want to remember.

"I'm telling you it's true! The other night, in town, he killed the entire bar of people! Yet he is sitting here like nothing happened!" hissed a girl in a loud whisper, her words large enough to fill the entire room.

Kaden lifted his chin slowly, raising his gaze as he continued to listen.

"I'm not lying, my butler witnessed it with his own eyes! How can one mistake those frightening green eyes, cursed by death! He is a calamity—death follows his wake!"

He would not refuse the truth, or fear.

He'd turn a blind eye to it, used to the biting phrases thrown in his direction, however painful they could be. But he wouldn't claim a misjudgment, admit to a crime he didn't do.

There was a point where things were taken too far.

The man rapped his finger on the old oaken table, tilting his head with a lighthearted smile. The woman slowly turned her head, the visible and harsh lump in her throat swallowed down as her face flushed.

"Aren't you rather daring?" wondered Kaden, adjusting his papers into a neat pile on the desk. "Were you hoping I'd hear you, listen to your rumours? Your ridiculous notions?"

"I have proof—"

"With your own eyes, did you see me do those things you claim?"

She gulped again, shaking her head hesitantly. "I-I did not, however—"

"Be careful what you say, Miss Selena." He remembered this gossiping classmate of his, narrowing his eyes as he laughed curtly. "Unless you're willing to bear the consequences of the lies you're spreading."

The classroom immediately fell into a hushed silence as she spun around, a slight tremble in her hands.

Her friend comforted her, rubbing her back and no doubt telling her to ignore the foolish words of a murderer like Kaden, though he'd been the one disgraced by the false information.

He sighed, leaning further into the chair. Changing his reputation wasn't something he intended to do, nor something that would be easily done with the shackles of the Chauvet's clasped over his limbs.

However, there could be a way to enter the classes he'd always been curious about.

Kaden always felt like he was suffocating, a noose slowly being tightened around his neck, day by day. He was also too aware of the discomfort his presence caused to others, and despised it.

But it was said that one might gain a certain sort of clarity after death, and he felt as if he'd been doused by cool water, refreshed after being woken from a long nightmare. He had to be alone, but how much else could he change?

What else could he do?

At the very least, he didn't need to be completely obedient as he'd once been, living a life that could hardly be called living.

Suddenly, a change in atmosphere in the room clouded over and the whispers begun again. Only, they weren't filled with dripping resentment and instead envy and admiration.

Kaden looked up as the man strolled serenely into the room, his expression fixed and cold, while his each step echoed with arrogance and strength. White-black hair swept back smoothly, yet carrying a messy casualness that added to his charm.

Those soulful eyes met his.

They flickered across the room, before resting in the seat beside Kaden, and the sinner had a terrible feeling.

It grew as the man walked past aisle after aisle, indifferent to all others.

Noah stopped finally, at the very back row, watching Kaden carefully as if their earlier encounter that morning had been a dream. Most of the seats were full, or saved by students who wanted to sit with their friends.

Kaden smiled easily, sliding back the chair next to him. "Won't you join me, Bellamy?"

Noah glanced at the waiting seat gloomily and slid his leather bag off his shoulder before pulling out the chair next to it, a single space separating the two.

When Kaden failed to do anything, Noah reached out and pushed the chair between them back against the table, before turning to face the front.

There were no other open seats in the room, with the exception of the ones in the middle of noisy crowds and groups of friends. Kaden also turned away, feeling the heat of the other who sat in the lonely row, inhabited by only two.

"Good morning, class." The professor strolled in at that moment, smiling patiently at the entire room. "It's a pleasure for me to be teaching you this year, and perhaps for many more to come. I hope you all are prepared for the experience."

Kaden's stare remained fixated on the front, trembling. Another dead body. Another sacrificed.

"My name is Professor Raymond, and I will be your language teacher."

Dead, for the sake of him.