“I have always taken a chance of eating a second serving of soup. The others never eat it so I just take what is left from the casserole before cleaning it.”

“AGAIN. THAT IS NOT A SIN.”

“Are you sure, Kimmy? I’ve done it a lot of times.”

“YES, I AM SURE. EAT THE DUMB SOUP, NO ONE CARES.”

While Gabrielle celebrated quietly on her side of the confessionary, Kimberly was starting to lose her patience. It had been a long time already! A long and arduous interrogation, and all they had to show for it were a bunch of times the girl had decided to get a second serving of potato water, the time she said she would work the field and instead went looking for berries in the forest, and one time she punched the fisher boy in Gwynedd for looking at her weird.

Kimberly was quite happy about that last one, to be honest.

But this was supposed to reveal the secrets of the witch! Was she lying? Was she still hiding things? The more she heard, the more she was convinced that this dumb girl was just that: a boring dumb girl! Honestly, she felt quite offended at the notion! She was promised an evil witch to torment, after all!

“There are also the times I stay awake at night.” Gabrielle continued confessing. “Sleeping is hard when there’s noise and all of you are very noisy at night.” The girls giggled, almost as if proud of this fact, while Gabrielle simply huffed. “So sometimes I walk out on my own.”

“HOW DO YOU KEEP SISTER MARINA AT BAY?”

“She always patrols the hallways the same way, avoiding her is easy.” Gabi nodded. “Simply waiting for her to go to down the stairs to the basement gives enough time to walk from the room to the kitchen.”

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“...AND THAT’S IT?”

“And sometimes, when I am in the kitchen, I take the chance and check if there’s any soup left for me to get a second serv–”

“ENOUGH. I DON’T CARE. I DON’T CARE ABOUT YOUR SERVINGS!!” Kimberly simply pushed out of her spot on the confessionary, shaking her head and crossing her arms with a huff. “I don’t care anymore! You’re fine, we are done with this part!”

Gabrielle carefully peeked from her own side of the confessionary. “Are you sure? I still had a few left.”

“Whatever they were, those are fine too! I don’t care!”

With a nod, Gabi simply smiled. Her secret weapon had worked once again: repetition. People hated repetition, and this is something she had discovered very, very early in her life. Repeat something enough times and people will get sick of talking, no matter what the subject is… and if they are too bothered to keep talking, they usually just leave things at that.

That way she didn’t have to talk about Baraqiel and the Rune. It was the perfect plan.

“Does this mean we are done here?” Gabrielle walked out of the confessionary, while Kimmy simply shook her head. “What else, then?”

Kimberly debated for a moment with herself, already clearing her throat to go back to her deep and intimidating voice… but simply decided against it. No, it was too tiresome and honestly, that redhead didn’t deserve so much effort at all.

“The second part of your Trial is now afoot, so shut up and listen to me!” The little girl frowned and shook a finger. “The Father is very busy lately, he almost never goes to his room these nights! And in that room, hidden somewhere, is the big box of toffee he always gets for himself every month!”

“You want me to take the box?” Gabi tilted her head for a moment.

“What!? No, that would be stupid! He would realize immediately! No, you have to get in there and take the candy inside! One for each of us.” The other girls giggled a bit harder at that, but Samantha simply kept quiet. This suddenly felt terrible to her. “Do it for us, and we will never pick on you again! That we promise!”

“And if I don’t…?”

“Then we will pick on you even more!” Kimberly pointed at Gabrielle, poking her nose. “For being a coward poop head!”

Gabi didn’t need any sort of magical powers to know that this whole ordeal was a scam. There was no way they would simply stop because of candy, and it’s not like she could tell the sisters about this at all… but if it bought her at least one day of peace? It would be enough.

Besides, and this idea just had come to the girl’s mind, if she managed to get in the Demiurge’s room, maybe she could find something interesting. Something that gave her a deeper understanding of the Runes…

“I will do it.”

The girls cheered as quietly as they could, but strongly enough to drown Samantha’s attempts to stop Gabrielle.

“We will wait for you in the chambers, then! Don’t you dare come back without the candy!”

As the rest of the group left, Samantha simply stared at Gabrielle for a moment. All her enthusiasm about the whole idea had left the building long ago, and she really wished she could just tell Gabi not to, but the deal was sealed now. So, in a low voice, the blonde girl simply said.

“Please be careful.”

And with that, she left the room as well. Gabrielle was now standing all on her own, taking little breaths and letting her little head race around the idea of entering right into the private chambers of the Demiurge himself…