Page 41 of House of Ruin
Fallon’s skin was pale, bordering on blue, and it was clear that she had been sitting there for a while, with a trickle of water running from the shower over her head and into her lap.
Unlike Jack Riverblood, Fallon wasn’t bloody. Neither was she torn apart.
But where before there used to be two forest-green eyes, now lay two empty holes as if someone had burned her eyes right out of her skull. Something black, like coal or ash, was smeared over her face.
Right in front of her leaning corpse, there was another altar. This one had the same symbols as the one near Jack’s body, but the circle was painted in black coal. Or ash.
A pair of eyeballs sat in the middle.
If Blaze had to guess, they were definitely Fallon’s eyeballs.
“Fuck,” Blaze muttered.
“Guys.” Andro’s voice was weak. “There—there’s something in her mouth. Do you see it?”
Blaze took a step closer, focusing on Fallon’s blue lips. Indeed, it seemed something was stuffed into her mouth; a tiny bit of white peeked through her parted lips.
“I don’t think we should touch it,” Jolene blurted when Val moved closer to Fallon, stepping over the altar. “We should call the Dean.”
Ignoring Jolene, Val stuffed her fingers inside Fallon’s mouth, pulling whatever was inside without a beat of hesitation.
It was a piece of paper.
Frowning, Val unfolded it as she returned to the group. Then she read the words out loud: “In the wild, there are beasts that eat snakes for breakfast, lunch, and dinner.”
“What the fuck?” Andro scoffed. “What’s that supposed to mean? We should really get—”
“It’s a message to us, don’t you fucking see?” Val hissed.
Jolene shook her head, wrapping her arms around herself as she took a step away. “This is fucked up,” she murmured.
Blaze couldn’t stop staring at Fallon’s corpse. The smell of rot mixed with something earthy and damp weighed heavy in the air, and it was getting harder and harder to breathe.
This wasn’t how everything was supposed to go.
And nothing made fucking sense.
“Ah, guys—” Andro chirped. He stood in the arch that opened to the lockers, his eyes focused on something. “The team is coming in.”
“We gotta move,” Val said without missing a beat.
And then she hurried out the showers and out the damned locker room.
Jolene didn’t hesitate, following suit, and so did Andro.
Before doing the same, Blaze exchanged a glance with Alecto, whose face had gotten pale.
He reached a hand towards her, linking their fingers, and then yanked her after him and out the door right before the whole team burst inside the locker room from the field.
Wordlessly, the Inner Circle rushed through the building’s dark corridors, Val leading the way to the other side of campus.
It wasn’t a good look. The body would be discovered anytime now, if it hadn’t been already. And there had to be at least a few people who’d seen the Inner Circle march into the lockers before.
Their only solace was that the time of death likely wasn’t too close to the end of the rockey game.
Alecto’s fingers were wrapped around Blaze’s tight, holding on to him. And it made something inside him flutter.
The feeling was very familiar to being about to throw up.
