By morning, the Praecia Veil was in chaos. Cain hurried out from his room, half-dressed, to find Claudia standing by the window, pale and trembling.

“Claudia, what is it?” he asked.

Her voice shook. “Another one. They... found him just outside the gates.

Cain’s stomach tightened. “How?”

Claudia swallowed. “His heart... It’s gone. And his—” she lowered her voice to a whisper. “They... put it where his heart should’ve been.”

The hallway fell silent. Somewhere below, someone began to cry, while another murmured a prayer too polished and too practised to carry conviction.

Cain turned toward the window. Beyond the glass, Seviel was waking, though rain had washed the streets clean only to reveal what the night had left behind. A patrol of officers drifted through the mist, their voices muffled and uncertain.

Behind him, Claudia trembled. He reached out with steady hands as he turned her gently by the shoulders. “Don’t look,” he whispered.

Together they descended the staircase, step by step.

The sound of their footsteps swallowed the hush clinging to the walls until they reached the library.

It was small compared to the rest of the Praecia Veil, but to Cain, it might as well have been a cathedral. Shelves of leather-bound books lined the walls, touched by no one but him. A fire smouldered low in the hearth, its glow brushing the spines of forgotten stories with warmth. Everything here felt still, almost sacred, as if it were a quiet rebellion against the chaos waiting beyond the door.

This room had been Cain’s refuge for years. It was here that he taught himself to read, whispering each word aloud until he was no longer frightened. The books didn’t hit, didn’t demand, didn’t touch. They simply existed. And in their stillness, he found his own.

No one else ever came here. None of the other courtesans could read, since Madam Lucinda considered literacy an indulgence rather than a necessity. Words don’t earn coin, she liked to say. Beauty does. So the girls remained carefully illiterate, their world kept small by design.

For Cain, that smallness was a gift. This room was his world alone.

He guided Claudia toward the couch and sat beside her. She leaned into him, shaking, her tears hitting his sleeves like small, warm raindrops.

“Cain,” she whispered. “It’s not fair. We smile for anyone who comes through those doors. We touch them, we tell them what they want to hear, we let them ruin our bodies. We make them believe they’re good men. But they’re not. None of them are.”

Cain listened in silence, while his hand gently traced circles over her back. When he finally spoke, his voice was low and steady. "We don’t know for sure who did this. People walk these streets knowing what Seviel is.”

Claudia shook her head, eyes glistening. “And what if it happens again? To one of us? You know we don’t get to choose our customers. We just smile and pray they leave us breathing.”

Cain’s thumb stilled against her shoulder. “No,” he said softly. “We don’t get to choose. Safety here is just another story we sell. We lie to them, and we lie to ourselves, because it’s easier that way, I suppose.”

“I’m scared,” she whispered.

“I know,” Cain murmured. “What happened is cruel and senseless. But we can’t stop the world from being cruel. We can only choose how we face it.”

He leaned back slightly, enough to catch her eyes. “We’re still here, aren’t we? Still breathing, still beautiful. That’s our defiance.”

Claudia almost smiled. “I hate how simple you make things sound.”

Cain laughed quietly. “It’s not simple. But it sounds nicer that way.”

He rose, offering her his hand. “Come on,” he said, faint amusement tugging at his lips. “Let’s go raid the kitchen.”

Claudia sniffled, slipping her hand into his. Together, they stepped out of the library, leaving behind the warmth of Cain’s secret sanctuary for the perfumed cold of the Praecia Veil.

༻𐫱༺

The kitchen was nearly silent when they slipped inside, still hand in hand. Everyone else must have been too shaken by this morning's events to bother eating.

Cain let go of Claudia’s hand and moved with quiet confidence along the dining table, plucking bits of fruit and cured meat, assembling a plate with an ease that made it seem almost ritualistic. He placed it in front of her like a silent offering.

“Eat.”

Claudia gave him a watery smile and sat down without protest.

Cain poured himself a cup of coffee, dark and bitter the way he liked it, then filled a glass of water for her.

He perched on the edge of the table, popping a grape into his mouth as if the world wasn’t quietly falling to shit outside. His appetite had long since deserted him, but the caffeine was enough to keep him upright.

The Praecia Veil had been restless lately. Chaos seemed to have a way of rearing its ugly head through those gilded walls. Cain knew this pattern well, though—it always came in waves: Some scandal, some corpse, some new decree from the church that sent the city spiralling. The panic would swell, crest, then fade into silence again. Dead bodies were nothing new in Seviel. But lately, he thought, the earth seemed hungrier.

He glanced at Claudia, watching her pick at the fruit like a child trying to be brave. Her hands still trembled, but she ate anyway. Cain took another sip of his coffee. For a moment, he let himself believe that this, this quiet warmth, and the small act of sharing food, was enough to keep the world at bay.

The sound of footsteps broke the fragile calm.

Eve and Candace walked into the kitchen, their eyes red and cheeks damp. They looked small, smaller than usual, their silk nightgowns hanging loose over their frame. They’d obviously heard the news too.

Without a word, they drifted toward the table and sank beside them with bowed heads and trembling shoulders. They didn’t look like they’d come to eat; they probably just couldn’t bear to be alone.

Cain rose quietly and began filling two more plates with a few slices of fruit, some bread, and whatever was on the table that was still edible. He set them down in front of the girls and gave them a slight nod of encouragement.

Eve and Candace were barely teenagers. At fifteen years old, they were still caught between childhood and the cruel theatre of womanhood that the Praecia Veil demanded. They should’ve been running through fields, climbing trees, and laughing until their stomachs hurt. Instead, they were here. Dressed up, performing for strangers, and learning the art of seduction before they even learned how to stop being afraid.

They’d been abandoned, sold, or forgotten, just like everyone else who found themselves within these walls. They spent their nights in the laps of older men, and their days pretending that the world beyond the curtains didn’t exist. They shouldn’t have to wake to the sight of corpses on the streets or learn that their worth was measured in coin and flesh.

The girls picked at their plates in silence. Claudia had gone quiet again, too. Her earlier tears were now replaced by the dullness that came after grief had burned itself out.

Cain sat back, sipping his coffee until he was certain they’d all eaten something, enough to keep them steady, if not whole. Then, setting his cup down, he gently rose and motioned for them to follow.

“Come on,” he said softly. “Let’s get out of here.”

They obeyed without question, moving as one fragile constellation: four quiet souls orbiting each other in the faint hope that, together, they could hold the dark at bay.

༻𐫱༺

Cain led the girls back to his room, the sound of their bare feet soft against the hall. The four of them climbed onto the bed without a word, just a small tangle of limbs and silks. Cain scooted over to make space, the mattress dipping beneath their combined weight.

Eve curled up in his arms, while Candace nestled beside Claudia, her head resting on her shoulder.

Cain brushed a stray curl from Eve’s forehead and whispered gently, “Have I ever told you about the water sprite?”

Eve shook her head, mumbling something against his chest.

“It’s a story I read once,” he said, his lips quirking faintly. “Good thing Madam doesn’t actually check her library, or the church would have her head for the sort of heresy hidden in those shelves.”

Candace peeked up at him with wide eyes. “What happens?”

Cain’s voice lowered, slipping into rhythm.

“A little brother and sister are playing by a well. They fall in, and at the bottom, a water sprite captures them. She forces them into servitude, giving them jobs like filling a bucket with a hole in it and chopping down a tree with a blunt axe.”

Eve frowned. “That’s impossible!”

“Exactly,” Cain said, the faintest smile playing at his mouth. “But one Sunday, while the sprite is away at church, the children seize the opportunity to escape. She notices, of course, and chases after them.”

Candace sat up a little, eyes bright. Claudia, half-smiling now, leaned back against the headboard.

“The girl, seeing the sprite closing in, throws a brush behind her. It grows into a huge mountain of thorns and brambles. The sprite claws her way through it, and just when she reaches the other side, the boy throws down a comb that turns into a mountain of ivory teeth!”

Eve gasped softly, half-afraid, half-thrilled.

“And finally,” Cain continued, “the girl throws her looking glass behind her. It becomes a mountain of glass, impossible to climb. The sprite tries and fails, so she goes back for an axe, but by the time she returns and shatters the glass to pieces…”

He paused, finger brushing through Eve’s hair.

“...the children are gone. Free at last.”

The room fell quiet. Eve’s breathing had slowed, her small body warm and still in his arms. Candace had nestled deeper against Claudia, their eyes half-lidded.

For a long moment, Cain watched them, their fragile peace, their borrowed safety, and let the stillness settle over him. He knew it wouldn’t last. But for now, the outside world could rage and bleed as it pleased.

Here, in this small room, there was quiet.

And for Cain, that was enough.

༻𐫱༺

Sisyphus: Condemned to the Underworld for his cunning and deceit. In life, he defied the natural order, first outwitting Thanatos (Death) by binding him in chains. For a time, no mortal could die, and the world fell into chaos until Zeus intervened to restore balance. As punishment, Sisyphus was sentenced to an eternal task: to push a great boulder up a hill, just to watch it roll back down each time he neared the summit.

Water Sprite: The Water-Nixie is a fairytale collected by the Brothers Grimm. It tells the story of two siblings who escape the clutches of a malicious water spirit by using magical items to slow down their pursuer.