Page 31 of The Sin Binder’s Destiny (The Seven Sins Academy #5)

Lucien remains still, but his gaze is pinned to the doorway, his expression unreadable. He doesn’t speak. The stiffness in his jaw tells me enough—he’s expecting a fight, or something worse.

“Is that it?” Elias says, but there’s no snark left in his voice. Just the echo of someone trying not to believe what they’re seeing. “Please tell me that’s not the door. Because it looks like it leads directly into someone’s recurring nightmare.”

“It is the door,” Orin confirms. He moves forward at last, his stride unhurried, his expression utterly composed. “And yes. It leads exactly where you think it does.”

“Cool. Fantastic,” Elias mutters, shifting closer to Luna like proximity might save him from whatever’s pulsing through that arch. “On a scale from ‘sacrificial’ to ‘eldritch mistake,’ how cursed are we about to be?”

“Very,” I say, because honesty is a rare luxury down here, and I like the sound of him squirming.

Luna glances back once, her gaze sweeping over all of us. Her expression is unreadable, but not closed. It’s something else. Like she’s already halfway between here and whatever waits through the gate, and part of her wants to be pulled back, but won’t say it aloud.

The light from the portal casts an unnatural glow across her skin. It makes her look too sharp, too real. Like she’s the only true thing in this realm, and everything else—us, this Keep, this tomb of Branwen’s design—is just illusion.

steps beside her with a crooked grin that doesn’t quite reach his eyes. “So... uh. Are we walking through that together, or is this like a ‘you go first and if you scream we turn back’ situation? Because I vote for ‘together.’ For emotional reasons. Also survival.”

Luna’s lips twitch, but she doesn’t smile.

Instead, she steps through.

The light swallows her instantly. No scream. No sound. No shift in the portal. Just—gone. I don’t hesitate. I follow. Because whatever waits on the other side, it’s not a question of whether I trust her. It’s whether I’m willing to be left behind. And I’m not.

The portal spits us into stillness. No scream. No rift. No falling. Just the sudden, jarring shift from the ancient weight of the Keep into something colder, older, and far more opulent. For a moment, none of us speak. We’re too busy looking—no, devouring what’s in front of us.

The room is massive. Cathedral-high ceilings lost in shadow. Vaulted arches carved in metallic script that catches light from nowhere and glows faint gold. The floor is marble, but not the white-veined kind found in noble palaces—this is obsidian inlaid with coins, thousands of them, sealed beneath the surface like they were frozen mid-fall.

And the mounds—gods.

Gold. Everywhere.

Mountains of it, like waves frozen mid-crest. Coins spilling across the floor in glittering chaos. Ornate chalices, blades with gemmed hilts, crowns snapped in half and carelessly discarded beside opal-encrusted armor. It’s wealth beyond comprehension. Empire-level. The kind of hoard kings would sell their kingdoms for, the kind of treasure gods would bleed each other over.

My mouth goes dry.

It hits like a drug.

This isn’t just currency. This is power. A kingdom reduced to glittering waste, hoarded like a dragon’s final confession. And in the center of it, half-buried beneath a sheared bust of some long-dead monarch, rests a black pedestal that hums with the same magic as the seal Luna woke.

I step forward without meaning to. The echo of my boots over coin makes the others hesitate behind me. This is a vault, yes—but not one meant to be opened. Not a gift. A trap disguised in seduction. And fuck, does it seduce.

I feel it in my blood, in my bones. Gold hums beneath my skin like memory.

I should look away.

I don’t.

Beside me, exhales like he just came.

“Oh,” he breathes, eyes wide, pupils blown. “Oh gods. Oh fuck, look at this.” He drops to a crouch beside a mound, scooping a handful of coins and letting them spill through his fingers with reverence. “You hear that? That’s the sound of ambition and self-loathing, and I am so into it.”

“Don’t touch anything,” Lucien snaps, stepping sharply behind him.

“Too late,” sings. “I touched everything. Look at this one—it’s got a griffin on it. Look at that detail. I could kiss it. I might kiss it.”

Riven kicks a small pile of rubies aside, eyes scanning the walls. “This is too much. No one hoards this kind of wealth unless they’re compensating.”

“Or hiding something beneath it,” I mutter, stepping closer to the pedestal at the center. The air around it vibrates faintly, as if the gold itself is holding its breath.

Luna’s gaze flicks around the chamber. She’s not touching the treasure, but she’s taking it all in—the structure, the carved ceiling, the inlaid runes, the unnatural way the light glows without a source. She looks less tempted and more wary, like she’s waiting for the floor to swallow one of us whole. Or all of us.

Elias sidles up beside her with a poorly timed grin. “So, uh… if you had to pick one, what would it be? The gold or me? Wait—don’t answer that. Obviously me. Unless you’re into inanimate objects, in which case, I could lie very still.”

Luna doesn’t even blink.

Elias clutches his heart. “Brutal. That’s fine. I like rejection. Feeds my character arc.”

hums, still crouched and digging through treasure like a horny magpie. “You’ve never had a character arc.”

“Not true,” Elias says. “One time I fell down the stairs at the academy and landed on a moral revelation.”

Lucien exhales slowly. “Can we focus?”

“No,” says instantly. “I’m busy communing with my deepest desires.”

“Gold isn’t a desire,” Orin murmurs from the far side of the room. “It’s a mirror. It only reflects what you’ve already lost.”

His voice draws everyone’s attention. He’s standing near the back wall, where the coins thin out and the shadows deepen. His hand hovers above a long crack in the marble, one the rest of us missed because of the way the treasure distracts. Even now, I don’t want to look at it. My body still wants the glitter, the glow, the wealth that could rebuild the world.

But Orin’s eyes are fixed elsewhere. Luna moves toward him, slow and measured, and the moment she passes the center pedestal, it lights. A deep, resonant pulse of magic surges from the base upward—into her, around her. The coins nearest her feet quake. Every gleaming surface reflects her, but distorted. Not like mirrors. Like memories refracted. Her face in every direction, twisted by regret and gold.

actually moans beside me.

“This is erotic,” he murmurs. “This is—gods, this is pure. This is everything I’ve ever wanted in one room. Luna and treasure. She could step on me right now and I’d thank her with interest.”

“You’re deeply unwell,” Riven mutters.

“Hot of you to say,” replies.

But my focus is on the pedestal. Something beneath the gold shifts. Not visibly. Not physically. But magically.

The air sharpens.

Orin’s voice returns, quiet, certain. “There’s a second seal here. Beneath the pedestal. Smaller. Compacted. Meant to cloak the last pillar in something irresistible.”

And that’s when I feel it.

The pull. Subtle. Ancient. Not compulsion, not seduction.

Claim.

Branwen built this place like a vault for her obsession—but this room doesn’t belong to her.

It was built for us. For the Sins. For what we represent.

And gold? Gold is mine.

My gaze sweeps the room again, but slower now. I see the patterns. The way the coins form spirals around the pedestal. The way the jewels lie in mirrored alignment, geometric and intentional. This room isn’t chaos. It’s code.

And Luna’s standing in the center of it.

“Don’t move,” I say.

She freezes.

The pedestal pulses again.

And then the gold moves. Just a little.

Elias

There are moments in your life when you know—you just know—you should turn around and pretend you never saw what’s in front of you.

This is one of them.

The vault is massive, stupidly vast, and glittering in a way that’s not even seductive anymore. It’s aggressive. Gold coins slither underfoot with every step. Jewels reflect the low, sourceless light in fractured rainbows. The whole place feels like a trap disguised as an orgasm. A monument to obsession and rot. Branwen didn’t just hoard this. She fed it. And now it’s looking back at us, teeth bared beneath all the gilded smiles.

is already spiraling.

The man’s hands are visibly shaking, and not in the “I’m-about-to-cry” way, but the “I might hump the floor” kind of tremor that means we’ve officially reached Code Gold. His pupils are blown. His mouth parted like he’s catching scent more than sight. And then I see it—his fingers twitching at his side like they’re physically aching to grab something shiny and unforgivable.

I knew it. I fucking knew it.

Veyd—the chaos connoisseur, the walking scandal, the man who once bit a royal guard for denying him a cursed dagger—is about to ruin everything for the fifth time this week, and I’m just happy to be here for it.

I don’t stop him.

I wouldn’t dare.

He bends down in front of the nearest gold mound like he’s at the altar of a very specific, very glittery god. His fingers hover above the coins—trembling, reverent. The man's practically vibrating.

And then Luna moves.

She’s across the room in seconds, quicker than any of us expected her to be in boots made for warfare and vengeance. Her hand grabs the back of ’s head like she’s done it before—and she probably has. Gods know they’ve got that cursed bond that practically hums when they look at each other.

freezes.

His spine locks up. His breath hitches. But his eyes stay fixed on the pile like the coins are whispering dirty secrets only he understands.

“I said don’t touch anything,” Luna growls low in his ear, her fingers curled in his hair, firm, unrelenting.

doesn’t argue—not exactly.

But he does let out a strangled noise, somewhere between a protest and a whimper. “But babe,” he breathes, “look at her. She’s so shiny. It’d be rude not to—”

“Up,” she says.

doesn’t move. She tightens her grip and yanks. And that’s when it happens.

fucking moans.

Loud.

Not subtle.

Not quiet.

The sound echoes through the cavern like a goddamn confession, and I bite the inside of my cheek so hard I taste copper. Riven looks like he’s aged ten years in three seconds. Lucien mutters something murderous under his breath. Ambrose doesn’t even blink. He just watches the pedestal like it might open its mouth and swallow us whole if we breathe wrong.

I, on the other hand, am not okay.

“What the fuck, ?” I hiss, half-laughing, half-mortified. “We’re literally standing in a sentient vault of cursed wealth, and you’re out here moaning like she just spit in your mouth.”

, to his credit, is panting now, eyes still on the coins. “She pulled my hair,” he gasps, like that explains everything. “I—I think I saw the gods. One of them winked at me.”

Luna lets go with a shove, and stumbles back onto his ass, still grinning like a man who just tasted divinity and wants seconds. I lose it. I have to turn away, one hand on my face, because if I make eye contact with anyone right now, I’m going to combust from secondhand embarrassment. Or arousal. Or both. Probably both.

“I hate it here,” I mutter, to no one in particular. “I hope the treasure eats us. Honestly. I hope we all die right here and now so I don’t have to live with the memory of having a full-body religious experience because Luna yanked his hair.”

Luna, stone-faced as ever, brushes her palms off on her coat like she’s just handled garbage, then looks at the rest of us like we’re the problem.

“You think that pedestal woke up for no reason?” she asks, already moving back toward the center of the vault like she didn’t just publicly dom in front of the entire group.

scrambles to his feet, still breathless, still glowing with that stupid, blissed-out grin, and follows her like a shadow.

Riven mutters, “He’s going to die in here.”

And Orin—unbothered as ever—simply hums. “Maybe. But at least he’ll die fulfilled.”

I don’t respond. Because Luna’s stopped walking. And now she’s staring at the pedestal. The gold around it is shifting again—just slightly. Not from her. Not from magic. Something beneath it is waking.

And this time, I don’t think it wants to be worshipped.

There’s a weight to the silence that follows. The kind that stretches too long. Not dramatic, not theatrical—just wrong. Like the room is holding its breath, and we’re the only ones too stupid to notice we’re standing at the edge of something that remembers hunger.

And then it speaks.

A voice—low, masculine, amused in the way only something ancient and blood-wet can be amused—slithers through the chamber like it owns the air. Like it always has.

“Ah. You’ve come for my gold.”

The words brush against the skin, inside the skull, deep enough to feel like they’re being inhaled instead of heard. My stomach knots, and I glance at the others—Riven’s already reaching for his blade, Caspian frozen mid-step, Luna standing dead still, magic coiled up around her shoulders like armor. But it’s Ambrose who doesn’t move at all. Just watches.

“It’s mine,” the voice continues, silk-wrapped steel, too deep to be fully human, too casual to be divine. “Every coin. Every gem. Every crown broken beneath the hands of kings. I took them. I earned them. I watched kingdoms fall for them.”

I don’t want to ask the obvious question, because I know the answer. We all do. But the room is starting to shift, the air tightening, the gold… moving.

Not like it’s alive.

Like something beneath it is waking up.

The largest mound—far back near the northern arch, maybe twenty feet tall, studded with shattered scepters and a ruined war helm the size of a small table—begins to quake. Slowly. Softly. Coins slough down its side like sand off a dune. Jewels roll loose and vanish into the cracks of the obsidian floor. Something massive groans beneath the pile.

And then it rises.

Gold splits in a slow cascade as something ancient and vast unfurls from beneath it.

Wings—massive, black-veined and iridescent, unfurl like blades carved from midnight. Their surface shimmers like polished obsidian, streaked with molten gold that pulses with every movement. Not leathery like stories tell, not scaled like beasts—they look alive, like fire frozen mid-bloom.

The creature’s body emerges next, dragging mounds of treasure with it. Massive, brutal, and not bound to any biology I recognize. Its limbs stretch long, coiled muscle and shadow, ribcage glinting with embedded metal—runes carved into its spine in languages I don’t think were ever meant to be spoken aloud. Horns curl from its skull like the bones of some long-dead god, wicked and spiraling, gilded at the tips. And then—then—the eyes open.

Gold. Not soft. Not warm.

Predatory. Endless. It looks at us like it’s been waiting.

“You don’t belong here,” the dragon says, and its mouth doesn’t move, not the way a mortal mouth would. The sound blooms through the vault like smoke. “But I suppose… you’ll do.”

There’s a beat of silence.

I step half a pace behind Luna. Not for protection—gods no. I’m not suicidal. But maybe for something like comfort. Or plausible deniability.

“So,” I say under my breath, “that’s a dragon. A real one. With a hoard and a voice and everything. That’s… awesome. That’s horrifying. I am turned on and deeply afraid.”

exhales slowly beside me. “That’s the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen.”

“He’s molting gold,” I hiss.

“I know,” whispers, awe-struck. “I think I’m in love.”

Luna doesn’t speak. Doesn’t move. Her eyes are locked on the beast’s. There’s no flinch. No step backward. Just that eerie calm she gets when she’s about to do something impossible.

The dragon tilts its head, gold scales along its cheek catching the vault-light and fracturing it into spears.

“You woke my seal.” The voice doesn’t question—it accuses. “You think because you carry her blood, you can take what was hidden?”

At that, Ambrose finally speaks.

“You’re not guarding the treasure,” he says, tone clipped, analytical. “You are the treasure.”

The dragon turns its gaze on him—and it’s like watching divinity blink. If Ambrose is unsettled, he doesn’t show it.

“Clever,” the beast murmurs, almost fond. “You’ll die first.”

“That tracks,” I say, nodding. “He usually pisses people off. Mostly people. Sometimes gods. Occasionally himself.”

Luna lifts a hand.

The dragon stills.

Her voice is steady, clear, low. “We’re not here for your gold.”

The dragon’s eyes narrow.

“Everyone who steps into my hoard says that. Right before they bleed.”

And then the creature lowers its head, tail coiling, body tense—but not with rage.

With delight.

“Prove you’re not here to steal it,” it purrs. “Or you die with it.”

So. That’s the game. Luna steps forward. And I’m about to watch her either reason with a dragon or be eaten alive by one. Either way, I am not missing this.

The gold responds. It shivers beneath her boots—not aggressively, not like it’s resisting her, but like it recognizes something in her. Like the dragon’s hoard, this endless monument to power, knows she’s not afraid of it. Not in the way the rest of us are. Not even like , who wants to fuck it. Luna’s calm in that terrifying way she gets when she’s already made a decision the rest of us haven’t caught up to yet.

The dragon watches her like she’s a riddle it already knows the answer to. Its eyes—liquid gold rimmed in void—track her like a predator tracking movement, but it doesn’t strike. Not yet. Its wings shift, casting shadows that crawl like oil across the mounds of treasure. Each breath it takes sends coins tumbling.

“We’re not here for your gold.” She says again.

“You’re lying,” it says, voice like molten steel poured through silk. “You came for the gold. You all do.”

“No,” Luna says, and her voice doesn’t rise. Doesn’t challenge. It grounds. “We’re looking for a pillar. A way out of this place. A portal. We don’t want your treasure.”

The dragon’s jaw parts, and I don’t know if it’s a snarl or a laugh, but the sound that follows drips with disdain. “A likely excuse, little fire. Do you think you’re the first to say that?” Its claws shift in the coins, talons longer than swords, the sound of metal scraping metal stretching too long to be natural. “Mortals always lie when they smell gold. And they always believe their lie is new.”

I glance at , whose mouth is still half-open, pupils dilated like he’s either aroused or religiously enlightened. Possibly both. Probably both. He raises a hand like he’s about to say something to help.

“Don’t,” I mutter.

“What? I was just going to say I’m offended he thinks we’re common thieves,” whispers. “I would never steal gold without a monologue.”

“You moaned when Luna yanked your hair. You’ve lost all moral high ground.”

“She made me feel things, Elias.”

The dragon’s head swivels in our direction—slow, deliberate. Its horns scrape against the ceiling with a low, resonant groan.

shuts up. For once.

“We didn’t come for this,” Riven says, stepping forward now, tone level. Practical. He’s always the reasonable one when shit starts to spiral. “We’re trapped in this realm. We need to leave it. The last pillar—if Branwen left one—would be hidden somewhere like this. Something only the desperate would dare approach.”

“Branwen,” the dragon repeats, dragging the name out like a bruise. “She made promises she could not keep. Offered bargains she had no right to bargain. Her magic still clings to this realm like ash. And you come carrying her scent, her seal, and tell me you are not here for what is mine?”

Gold stirs around its claws. Coins ripple outward like a tide. The vault groans again, and somewhere behind us, a few sapphires fall like water from a shattered chalice.

“Technically,” I say, because someone has to, “if we were here for the gold, don’t you think we’d be running with it already? Or at least stuffing it down our pants?”

Lucien groans softly. “Why are you speaking.”

“I’m adding context,” I snap. “He’s making a lot of assumptions. I’m just saying, if we were looters, we’d be dead already, and would have gold coins in all his bodily crevices.”

“I do,” says helpfully.

“Shut up,” half of us chorus.