Deceit

Gallows Hill University announces itself not as an institution of learning but of lineage.

Gallows Hill University announces itself not as an institution of learning but of lineage. Born from the ashes of the Salem witch trials, a secret society called the Brethren was founded to protect the righteous from the vengeance of the condemned and their descendants. Loyalty is rewarded with the world itself. Betrayal follows the path of the wicked: burned and buried. This is not a welcome letter — it is a blood contract disguised as an invitation, the first warning that Salem's most powerful families have rules older than the republic, and consequences that predate the constitution. Every student who walks through those gates has already been chosen. The only question is what they've been chosen for.

Her father announces a husband she's never met

Skyla Parris has spent her entire nineteen years in London, raised by her Aunt Steph after her mother's death, sheltered from the cold indifference of her father Henry. Now Henry has summoned her home to Salem, Massachusetts. On the private plane — the first real conversation they've shared in years — he delivers the news without preamble: she is engaged to Asher Putnam. The date is set. She will attend Gallows Hill University, live in a dormitory bearing her family name, and learn to love her fiancé. Skyla's protests about her age, about marrying a stranger, are met with stony silence. Henry's only instruction: trust the Putnam men, they will protect you. The gilded cage that has shaped her entire life has simply changed cities.

Asher greets his bride with another woman on her bed

Skyla's father promised Asher would be waiting in her dorm to introduce himself. He was — naked, thrusting into a dark-haired woman named Bridgette on Skyla's own bed. Asher dismisses Bridgette without a kiss, circles Skyla like a predator, and dubs her Princess with open contempt. He throws a jewelry box containing her engagement ring at her chest. She lets it hit the floor. His message is unmistakable: he didn't choose this, he resents her presence, and he will make her miserable until she breaks. Later, the campus nurse forcibly administers birth control and an STD panel — university policy for all female students, a reminder that even Skyla's body is not fully hers in this world of arranged bloodlines and institutional control.

A swim coach and a banned swimmer share stolen stillness Swimming was Skyla's forbidden passion — her father killed her lessons and had her school ban her from the pool the moment she showed Olympic ambition. Finding the Gallows Hill natatorium feels like finding oxygen. She sits at the edge, toes breaking the…