Page 36 of Ruthless Knot

Not that too.

They've already taken my letters.

My connection to S.W.

My proof that the world outside exists.

If they take dance—if they take the only thing I have left?—

What then?

What do I become when there's nothing left to hold onto?

The question terrifies me more than any Alpha, any blade, any violence this nightmare academy can throw at me.

Because I know the answer.

I become nothing.

A shell filled with darkness.

A monster with no reason to pretend at humanity.

The thought makes me want to laugh.

Or cry.

Or both.

My feet keep moving—one step, two steps, three steps, four—carrying me toward the art sector, toward the answers I'm terrified to find, toward a future that feels more uncertain than ever.

The morning sun beats down on my pink hair.

The vanilla smoke scent still clings to my skin.

And somewhere in the back of my mind, a single thought crystallizes through the chaos:

Will my love for dancing be pulled from under me as well?

CHAPTER 4

The Scent Of Secrets

~SAGE~

Arriving at this academy was clearly a mistake.

I've known it from the moment our transport crossed through the reinforced gates—past the barbed wire and armed guards and warning signs that promised death to anyone stupid enough to try escaping. Knew it when I saw the concrete buildings rising like tombstones against the grey sky.Knew it when the first body swung from the welcome fountain, strung up like a macabre decoration for our arrival.

Just another day in the secluded paradise.

This place is a fucking nightmare dressed up as education.

And we walked right into it.

The morning air bites at my exposed skin as I make my way toward the post office, my pink hair—the shade of bubble-gum, of cotton candy, of everything soft and deceptive—catching the early light. It's barely past six AM, that grey hour between darkness and dawn when the world feels thin and dangerous.

In the Ruthless sector of Hard Knot Academy, that feeling never quite goes away.