Page 56 of The Sin Binder’s Chains (The Seven Sins Academy #2)

The fire crackles with the kind of restraint only we can afford, low flames fed by magic, not wood, burning without scent, without smoke. A practical decision. We don’t need to draw attention to ourselves in a place already fraying at the edges.

Luna sits beside her sister, holding Layla’s hand like it tethers her to something that still makes sense. I don’t interrupt. Not yet.

She needs this pause. A breath before the next descent. Even if it’s nothing more than the illusion of rest.

Elias sprawls across a jagged rock like it’s personally offended him, humming something that isn’t quite a tune and definitely isn’t pleasant.

Riven sharpens his blades, not because he needs to, but because routine is the only thing he still trusts.

Silas watches Luna like he’s counting her heartbeats.

Lucien stands. Always. He’ll burn before he allows himself the indulgence of stillness.

I stay at the fire, seated cross-legged, spine straight, hands folded in my lap. The old way.

Luna glances at me. Sharp. Tired. Curious.

She doesn’t ask. But she wants to.

“You’re worried about her,” I say, my voice low, meant only for her.

Her brows draw together. “She’s my sister.”

“And you think I would question that?”

“No,” she says too quickly. “I just… She’s not like me.”

“No,” I agree, eyes on the flame. “She’s like what you were. Before Daemon. Before us.”

Her breath catches, just a whisper. But it’s enough.

“She’ll be fine,” I continue. “As fine as anyone can be when they’re part of something this ancient. This tangled.”

Luna’s voice thins, stretched tight. “You think she can do it? What I did?”

“That’s the wrong question.” I meet her gaze. “The question is whether Severin will let her.”

Layla stirs, head tipping toward Luna, eyes half-lidded with exhaustion. Her bond to the Sub-Sins keeps her skimming the surface of sleep. Always listening. Always braced.

“She’s not going in alone,” Luna says. “We’re going to find a way to meet her halfway.”

“She’s walking into a cage dressed like a door. Even if she binds them, ” I glance toward the horizon, the place where reality feels too thin. “There are locks older than anything you’ve touched, Luna. Not everything unravels the way you think it will.”

She bristles. “I don’t want to unravel it. I want to break it.”

There it is again. That hunger. Not wrath, not pride. Something deeper. Something feral in its patience.

Lucien lifts his head slightly, like he feels it too.

I rise slowly, brushing ash from my hands. I move toward her with the kind of deliberate care reserved for unstable relics.

“We don’t always get to choose what we become,” I say softly. “But you’re not becoming something new, Luna. You’re becoming what you’ve always been.”

She stands, her grip on Layla loosening. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

I stop in front of her. Close enough for her to feel the weight of my presence. My knowing.

“It means,” I say carefully, “there are things older than the Hollow. Older than Severin. And they remember you. Even if you don’t remember them.”

Her breath catches.

Elias mutters from behind, “Well, that’s ominous as fuck.”

“Good,” I murmur without looking away. “She needs to be afraid of it. Just a little.”

“I’m not afraid,” Luna says flatly.

I reach out. Brush my knuckles down the side of her face. A touch too brief to be tender. Too heavy to be meaningless.

“No,” I say. “You’re not. And that’s what scares me.”

Lucien steps into the firelight, and the moment fractures. He looks at Luna, then at me, and something passes between us. Not accusation. But recognition.

Elias stands too fast. “Alright, what the fuck did I miss? Is this the part where you two start speaking in cryptic prophecy again? Should I be worried the fire just flickered like it heard you?”

“No,” I say, calm. “But you should be worried that it listened.”

Riven snorts. Silas doesn’t move.

Luna straightens, eyes back on Layla. “She’s leaving in the morning.”

“We all are,” Lucien corrects.

“No,” she says. “She’s going north. Toward the old Temple ruins. The Sub-Sins are drawn to places that remember their names.”

I look at her again, and this time, the world tilts.

She’s leading us. Without realizing it.

Without permission.

Perfect.

“Then we leave at dawn,” I say. “All of us. For now, rest. Whatever comes next won’t wait for permission either.”

Elias groans. “Can’t wait. Nothing says good dreams like impending cosmic collapse.”

He drops to the ground beside the fire and mutters something about ‘asshole prophecies’ and ‘death by allegory.’

Luna doesn’t laugh. But her mouth twitches like she wants to.

Progress.

I return to the fire, watching the flames twist toward the stars that don’t quite exist. The Hollow listens. It always does.

But for the first time in a thousand years… it isn’t listening to me.

It’s listening to her.

And that changes everything.

She waits until the others drift. Until the fire burns lower, until Elias starts snoring, not real sleep, just loud enough to pretend he’s not listening. Layla’s already gone quiet, curled beneath the edge of Lucien’s warding spells like she can out-sleep what’s coming.

But Luna lingers.

She gets up to stand just beyond the firelight, arms folded, weight shifted like she’s pacing internally. She doesn’t speak, not right away. I let her come to me. I always do.

When she finally does, her voice is quieter than I expect. Not uncertain. Just… stripped.

“Explain it to me again,” she says. “The pull. Before the binding.”

I watch her, the sharp edge of her silhouette blurred by shadow, hair tied back in a knot that’s already started to loosen. She looks tired. But not weak. Luna never looks weak.

I don’t answer right away. I shift, unfolding from where I’ve been seated cross-legged beneath a ridge of crumbling stone. The Hollow doesn’t offer much in the way of comfort. But I don’t need comfort.

She does.

So I rise.

“The pull,” I say slowly, “isn’t a decision. It’s instinct. Deeper than magic, older than language.”

She exhales like she already hates the answer.

“You’re not answering the question.”

“I am,” I say, stepping closer. Close enough that I can see the storm behind her eyes. “You’re just not ready to hear it.”

She doesn’t flinch. “Try me.”

So I do.

“The Sub-Sins were created with an imbalance in their bones. Born from fragments of the original sins, cast off like splinters too volatile to contain. They weren’t meant to exist on their own, not really. That’s why the Binder exists. Not to trap them. Not to hurt them. But to anchor them.”

She studies me. Not with suspicion. With need.

“So Layla…”

“She is their balance,” I say. “Not a captor. A center.”

Her jaw tightens, just slightly. “And they’ll just… feel it?”

“They already do.”

I reach out before I can stop myself. A single finger, brushing the edge of her wrist. Her skin is too warm, like she’s been holding onto fire.

“He can’t hurt her,” I say, voice lower now, weight behind it.

“Severin might want to. Might believe he can. But it would be like turning a blade against his spine. The Sub-Sins will be drawn to Layla whether they want to be or not. That’s the nature of what they are.

Their purpose is to be held. To be kept. By her.”

“And if she doesn’t want to hold them?” she asks.

“She won’t have a choice.”

Luna exhales, but it’s not relief. It’s a quiet kind of fury, tempered by exhaustion. “That sounds familiar.”

I don’t argue. Because it is. It’s the same thread that coils through her, through us. The binding isn’t desire. It’s gravity. And she’s still learning which way it pulls.

“She’s not like me,” she says, voice rough. “She’s not ready.”

“No one is ready to bind something hungry,” I murmur. “Especially not monsters who want to belong to her.”

Luna’s throat bobs. She looks down, then back up, her voice tighter now. “You make it sound like it’s beautiful. That thing. The pull.”

“It is,” I say. “And it’s ruin.”

For a moment, the wind shifts. Not real wind. The Hollow doesn’t breathe. But the ruins around us creak. The world remembers things here. It listens.

Luna crosses her arms. “If she fails? ”

“She won’t.”

I don’t say it to comfort her. I say it because I’ve seen what happens when a Binder doesn’t finish what she was made to do. I’ve seen what becomes of the world when power isn’t held in check by something soft.

“She’ll feel them, Luna,” I say. “Every fractured edge. Every hunger. And if she lets herself answer it, if she reaches for that connection, they won’t be able to resist.”

“And if she doesn’t?”

“Then they’ll burn for her from the inside out,” I say. “They’ll unravel. And so will she.”

Luna closes her eyes.

I don’t touch her again. I want to.

“You’re not responsible for her choice,” I say. “But she is.”

“That doesn’t make it easier.”

“No,” I say softly. “It makes it matter.”

She looks up at me again, and this time her eyes are wet. Not crying. Just too full.

I’ve lived long enough to know what that look means. She doesn’t want to carry this. But she will. Even if it ruins her. And still, I do not tell her not to. Because I would do the same for her. Every time.

Behind us, Elias groans, loud and theatrical. “Are we having an emotional breakthrough right now? Because I swear to all things ancient, if I wake up to feelings- ”

“You’re not awake,” Luna calls over her shoulder.

“I am awake,” he says, voice muffled by his arm. “And I am emotionally compromised. You both should be ashamed.”

“You’re jealous you’re not the one having a heart-to-heart,” she mutters.

“Jealous? Luna, please,” he groans. “If I wanted to cry about my trauma, I’d write poetry and join a blood cult.”

“Didn’t you already do that?” she calls back.

He doesn’t answer. But I hear the grin in his silence.

I look at her one more time. And though I say nothing, I know she hears the thing I do not speak.