Page 11 of Barons of Decay (Royals of Forsyth University #10)

H unter

We carry him by the shoulders and ankles.

Armand’s heavier than I expected. All that swagger, boiled down to muscle, blood, and bones.

In engineering, we call it dead load–the static weight a structure has to carry no matter what.

Permanent. Inescapable. That’s what this feels like.

Like I’m hauling something the world was never meant to support for long.

DK takes most of the weight without complaining, his jaw tight, brow furrowed like he's not here at all. Somewhere else. Maybe back earlier tonight. Back to the table. To her. I know I can’t get it out of my head, either.

Her.

Get her out of my mind.

I’m sweating despite the cool morning air, the chill settling in under the cloak now that we’re away from the ceremonial ring and its torches. I’d wanted a shower. Sleep. Instead, we got our first real job as Barons. A privilege, the King said.

“Ushering the fallen through the veil.”

We don’t speak as we follow the Shadow leading us down the path, winding through trees. It eventually gives way to one of the crypt entrances tucked against the side of the hill, half-buried under wisteria.

“Careful,” the one holding the iron door open says. “Watch your step.”

Inside, it smells of earth and old metal. Damp stone and rust and time. There’s a sense of history here, thick and quiet, like the walls remember every name ever laid to rest within them. This place has been hiding bodies for generations. And now, we’re part of it.

Servants of Forsyth. Of life and death.

That’s what the King said.

But no one tells you what it feels like to carry death in your hands.

We still have blood on our hands from the Claiming.

It’s caked on my fingertips and I can still feel the warmth of her skin as we painted her, the ripple of goosebumps rising across her velvety brown flesh.

Her dark, soulful eyes carried a trace of mania, but she knew we had leverage and that kept her from fighting back.

DK took the fall for killing Armand, which means we own her beyond the ceremony.

My fingers ache around the memory of the knife, the way it fit in my hand too well.

I can still picture her–strapped to the table, body trembling.

Was that fear? Or want? From the cuts? From DK’s playing with her pussy?

Pain or pleasure?

Maybe both.

Her eyes were wild when he removed his fingers.

I know that look. I’ve seen it. Felt it.

Desperate for just a little more. By the time we reach the second door, my arms are screaming, and it’s a relief to lower Armand down onto the stone slab.

We let him rest flat on his back. It’s more definitive like that.

More real. His throat is open, the slash deeper than I thought she could manage.

Skin split clean, from one side to the other, across his throat. The muscle beneath is jagged and wet.

“Huh,” I mutter, shifting his foot so it doesn’t fall off the slab.

“What?” DK asks.

“Guess Royal blood looks like the rest of ours after all.”

“Seriously.” DK rubs his palms on his pants and leans in to study the wound. “Fuck. She got him in one swipe.”

I glance at him, then at the line across his throat. That scar of his–it’s gnarled and angry, different from the one we’re staring at now. But if he doesn’t bring it up, I won’t either.

“Are you surprised?” I ask. “That she did it?”

“Maybe,” he admits. “Although, from what we know about her… she was strong enough to get away from whoever had her. Maybe this isn’t her first kill.”

I lean back against the wall and breathe through my mouth. The whole crypt hums with silence, like the dead are listening. Listening and waiting.

“She didn’t hesitate,” I say, nodding at the cut.

“Nope.” DK’s hand runs through his dark hair, then his teeth worry at the ring in his lip. “She’s not like other girls.”

“No.” I lick my dry lips. “She’s smart–hiding from us longer than I thought she would. Calculated. Armand was twice as big as her, and she still got the upper hand.” I replay the scene in my head. “She waited for the opening and took it.”

“Dangerous smart,” he says. No judgment in it. Just fact. Maybe even admiration. Or fear. Or both.

“Do you believe her? That she didn’t just kill him because she panicked?”

She’d defended herself fast. Claimed Armand was trying to rape her. There was evidence. Her panties–torn and dirty on the ground. His pants–unzipped. The Shadows had tucked him back in before carrying him out, but we’d all seen.

“I do,” DK says, glancing up. “She killed him because he broke the rules.”

There’s a long silence after that. The crypt seems to hold it, keep it.

I stare at Armand’s slack face. Glossy eyes, just barely open.

He was the only real Royal among us. A fucking Stein.

His family will want him back. Cleaned. Embalmed.

Placed in a gilded tomb in the cemetery like a relic.

He won’t be like the others down here. The ones the Barons tuck into the walls of the catacombs, the ones who hold up Forsyth’s foundation for eternity.

But we brought him here. We touched the truth of it.

DK rises, brushing off his palms. “Guess this makes us real Barons now.”

He’s probably right. More than the oaths or the rites. This is the job.

“What happens next?” I ask, turning to the Shadow by the door.

“Normally, this would be the start of the journey through the veil,” he says, frowning down at Armand. “He’d get a Baron ceremony, but honestly? I’m not even sure it counts since he didn't survive the Hunt or make it through the Claiming.”

The thought of Armand giving Arianette a mark on the altar is chilling. Not that what I did to her was a picnic, but I have a feeling he would have made her suffer.

“Due to the circumstances,” my new frat brother continues, “the King will handle this one directly.”

I give Armand one last look. His expensive watch. His polished shoes. None of it mattered. Not in the end.

Life is fleeting.

And it can end in the most unexpected ways. By the most unexpected hands. My stomach twists. I think of the knife. The way her fingers curled around it like it belonged to her.

Like it always had.

The weirdest part?

That’s exactly how it felt in my hands, too.

The Barons’ room is located in the old chapel, now called the House of Night.

The walls and floors are stone, making the hallways and rooms constantly cool.

A fire is already lit in the hearth, low but steady, casting amber light across the room.

It’s a far cry from the ancient dormitories on campus, where the carpet smelled like stale beer and mold.

People roamed the halls all day and night, disrupting my sleep and studies.

I couldn’t complain since I lived there for free due to my father working for the university, but the House of Night has a quiet serenity I don’t take for granted.

The room is big enough for all three of us to share–a requirement, it seems, for the Barons to live in a community.

There are three beds and dressers and a big closet divided for us to share.

Now, only two of the beds are made up. The third is already stripped bare, nothing but a mattress and silence.

Armand’s gone. Not just dead–erased. His things packed up, no sign he ever slept here. The wardrobe doors creak faintly, open now and empty. His shelf on the wall, bare.

We’d only been here a few days, moving in just after they accepted our bids to join brN. Not really long enough to settle in, but when three men walk into the forest on a hunt, you expect everyone to come back. That didn’t happen.

Ares lets out a soft, nasal huff as he trots over to me, tail wagging slow and low. He sniffs my pants, my boots, his nose twitching at the blood I didn’t quite wash off down in the tunnel. Dirt. Ash. Death.

“Yeah, I know,” I mutter, raking a hand through his brindled fur. “Smells like hell.”

He presses his forehead against my shin for a second, then wanders back to curl by the hearth, eyes watching the flames. He's always alert. Never fully relaxed. Not even when I’m here.

I was surprised when the King allowed me to bring him into the House of Night. I figured a pet would be a dealbreaker, but either he’s a fan of dogs, or that’s how bad he wanted me to join the ranks. Why, though? Why me? Us?

I glance up to ask DK, but he’s already stripped off his shirt and disappeared into the bathroom without a word. The pipes groan to life. I hear the sharp hiss of water, the clatter of boots kicked aside.

Alone for the first time in hours, I sit.

The chair by the fire is too stiff to be comfortable, but I don’t move. The warmth licks at my shins. My body aches from the weight of Armand, from the weight of what we just became. Real Barons. I guess.

I lean forward, elbows on knees, watching Ares stretch and resettle with a huff. His ears flick at every sound–he’s always listening. Always bracing.

I wonder if she’s bracing too.

Her room is down the hall. The door was shut when we walked by. Is she alone now? Asleep? Still awake with adrenaline coiled tight in her gut? Is she thinking about how we chased her down? What DK did to her? How I watched…

My spine tingles, a warning about getting too close. I’d taken the risk tonight when I painted the blood over her smooth skin. When I held the knife. But there were people around: the Shadows and King.

It was safe.

The door creaks open, and DK steps out, steam trailing behind him. Damp hair, clean shirt clinging to his chest. He smells like soap and something herbal. He catches me looking and shrugs. “You’re up.”

I nod, using all of my strength to get up. I feel like I haven’t stopped moving since last night. As I pass him, he doesn’t say anything. Doesn’t ask. But I know he’s thinking it too.

What comes next?

We’ve only just stepped into our roles. Just caught our first real whiff of rot and truth. And Arianette–she's in the thick of it. Closer to it than either of us, and more dangerous than we realized.

The shower is hot, I step in, water beating down on my neck and shoulders like it can burn off everything that’s happened.

The knife. The blood. Her breath hitching under me. The way Armand’s body felt in my hands.

Dead weight.

We may have left Armand in the crypt, but that weight: heavy, wet– inescapable –has already settled into my bones.

And no amount of scrubbing will ever get it out.