Page 67 of The Sin-Binder’s Fate (The Seven Sins Academy #1)

I turn, blade still dripping wraith blood, breath shallow in my chest. Silas is here, somewhere.

I narrow my eyes. Because I don’t see one Silas. I see six. All of them grinning. All of them standing in a loose, lazy semi-circle around me, weapons drawn, moving exactly the same way.

I swipe the back of my hand across my cheek, smearing blood that’s not mine, and scowl. "Okay. Which one of you is real?"

Six identical versions of Silas tilt their heads, considering.

Then, all at once,

“Me.”

A muscle ticks in my jaw.

"Not helpful."

One Silas steps forward, running a hand through his disheveled hair. "Why don’t you just feel it? The bond should tell you, right?"

"Maybe if you weren’t a walking disaster, it would be easier. "

The Silas clones all inhale sharply, clutching their chests in mock devastation.

"Wow. Wow. That hurts, Moonbeam."

"She wounds me."

"A fatal blow."

I exhale sharply. "You’re all saying the same thing at the same time. That’s terrifying."

The Silases exchange glances. Then, as one, they move, tugging at their collars, shifting their weight, cracking their knuckles. All at once.

I press my lips together, fingers tightening on my weapon. This is annoying. And also, freakishly impressive.

One Silas, the same one that stepped forward first, grins. "Okay, fine. Watch this. I’ll prove it."

He lifts a hand and scratches the back of his head. All six of them copy it. He exhales, rolling his shoulders back. Six versions. Exact same movement.

His smirk falters. "Wait, no. Hold on."

He shifts his weight. The others follow. He gestures vaguely. They all gesture vaguely.

I fold my arms. "You see the problem, right?"

Silas groans, dragging his hands down his face. "I hate me so much right now."

"That makes two of us."

The clones nod.

Silas flinches, then glares at them. "Okay, stop that. Seriously."

"Okay, stop that. Seriously," the clones echo.

Silas makes a choked noise. "Luna, fix me."

"Fix you?" I laugh, raising a brow. "I don’t even know which one to stab."

Silas straightens. "Oh. Oh, I can fix that. "

He pivots, and decks one of his clones in the face. The illusion bursts, shattering into shards of light before vanishing.

"Hah!" He looks smug for all of two seconds.

Before all four remaining illusions immediately swing their fists at him.

I snort. "Yeah. You’re doing great, Silas."

I feel him. The bond is still new, still foreign.

He’s a live wire inside me, jittery and chaotic, his emotions everywhere.

And beneath the mess, beneath the awkwardness and the nervous energy that is Silas fucking Veyd, There’s something solid.

A pull. Something stretching outward. Not just to him. To the others.

I swallow, pulse unsteady as the feeling drags through me. They’re there. I can feel all of them. Not just Silas.

I take a sharp breath, and Silas, the real one, finally, blinks at me. His illusions flicker for half a second before snapping back into focus.

"Moonbeam?"

I look at him.

His grin falters, just slightly. Because he feels it, too. This is a new level of hell. I should be focused on the battle, the wraiths still prowling, the monsters still trying to tear us apart. The entire world is burning around me.

But all I can think about is him .

Silas, who I just slept with.

Silas, who won’t stop looking at me.

Silas, who is still wearing that damn smirk like he just found religion in my body.

I force myself to move. Slash my blade through a wraith’s throat, feel the hot spray of its essence dissolve into the air. My hands are steady. My legs are strong. My body is battle-ready.

My mind?

Ruined.

Because when I glance over, Silas is effortlessly weaving between illusions of himself, making it impossible to tell which version is real.

I hate how good he looks. The blood streaked across his cheek, the wild energy in his green eyes. His magic makes the air around him hum, a dozen Silases moving in sync, grinning, taunting, dangerous.

I liked him before.

Now? I might actually be obsessed. Oh, god. I need to say something. Anything.

“You, uh.” I clear my throat, kicking a wraith off my blade. “You’re looking very…”

Silas raises a brow. Every single one of him does.

I hate myself.

“…Present.”

I want to die.

Silas blinks, then lets out a choking sound, like he can’t believe how awful that was.

“Present?” His illusions echo it at full volume.

I really want to die.

“You look present,” he repeats, absolutely delighted in my suffering. “Wow. That’s… definitely a choice.”

“I meant alive. ”

“No, no, don’t take it back now, baby girl.” He’s beaming. “I love it. I’m feeling so present. So incredibly, undeniably here.”

One of his illusions twirls, another does a dramatic hair flip. All of them are laughing.

I grip my sword harder. “I will actually stab you.”

Silas winks.

“You already did.”

I am going to perish. Right here, right now. Not from the battle, not from the endless swarm of wraiths, not even from sheer exhaustion.

No, I am going to die because Silas just finger-gunned me.

And worse? I did it back. I don’t even know why. It just happened. My body betrayed me. One second, I’m locked in combat, slicing through monsters with deadly precision. The next, I’m staring at Silas across the battlefield, his hand up in that cocky, idiotic pose, and my traitorous fingers just,

Bang. Bang. The second it’s done, I realize what I’ve done. Silas freezes. His eyes widen. Then, he loses his goddamn mind.

“Oh. Oh.” His illusions shatter around him as he staggers backward, clutching his chest like I just shot him for real. “Oh my God, you-” His voice cracks. “You just finger-gunned me back.”

I want to run into the wraiths and let them finish me off.

“I didn’t mean, ” I start, but he isn’t hearing it .

“She did it back.” He’s cackling. Absolutely feral. “She’s gone for me. Oh, my sweet sins, it’s happening.”

“It’s not happening.”

“It’s happening.”

“I did it ironically!”

“Oh, sure, sure.” He nods sagely. Mocking. “You didn’t mean to. It just slipped out.”

I glare. “You finger-gunned me first!”

“Yeah, but I’m Silas.” He grins. “That’s expected.”

“That doesn’t even,” I groan, pushing a hand through my blood-matted hair. “This is your fault. You’re inside me.”

His grin broadens. “I was inside you, all right.”

Silence. I blink. He blinks. I see the exact moment his soul leaves his body.

“Oh, fuck. Not what I meant.” He whispers it, horrified.

I blurt, “I didn’t mean it like that either!”

“Yeah, yeah, totally, of course, because it would be really weird if you were thinking about that right now.”

“Exactly!”

“Except you clearly are.”

“I’m not!”

“You’re so thinking about it.”

“I am trying to survive!”

“Oh, I bet. Survive my dick.”

I launch a throwing knife at him. He dodges. Barely. But it’s close enough to make him yelp.

“Okay, okay!” He throws his hands up, laughing through the sheer cringe. “Truce, truce. No more innuendos.”

I cross my arms, glowering. “You’re insufferable.”

“And yet.” He winks. Finger-guns me again.

The battlefield shudders beneath us. It’s a slow, deliberate sound, a measured, predatory rhythm that shouldn’t make my pulse stutter, but does. Heavy footfalls. Clawed. Deep. Not wraiths. Not the skittering insect-like horrors from before. Something worse.

I taste ash in the air before I see him. From the darkened edge of the battlefield, the shadows stretch apart, peeling away like smoke caught in an unseen wind. A beast steps through.

Not a beast. A monster.

Massive, hulking, its shoulders broad enough to crush stone.

Sleek black fur ripples over thick muscle, spined ridges lining its back.

Its head is wolf-like, but grotesquely exaggerated, its snout elongated into something too sharp, too jagged, too wrong.

A snarl pulls back lips over rows of dripping fangs, glowing red cracks splintering along its throat.

A Hellhound. And riding atop it, A man.

I barely get a glimpse of him before Silas shoves me behind him.

“Stay there.” His voice has lost its usual humor, the sharp edges of it slicing into my skin.

I blink at his back, stunned by his sudden shift in demeanor. “Silas?”

He doesn’t answer me. Because the man atop the beast tilts his head, golden eyes gleaming from beneath a shadowed hood, and laughs.

"Hello, Silas."

The voice is rich, smooth, a lazy kind of arrogance dripping from every syllable. It wraps around me like oil, thick, cloying, leaving something cold and unpleasant curling in my stomach.

Silas' fingers twitch at his sides.

I glance between them, heart hammering. "Who is that? "

His shoulders go rigid. "Him?" His voice is lighter now, but it’s a forced thing, stretched too thin to be real. “That’s my brother."

The man smirks, resting a gloved hand against the hound’s neck. "Don’t sound so excited."

More of him appear. One blink, and Silas is beside me. Another, and he’s in front. Then to the left. To the right. Surrounding me. A dozen versions of him, all standing at different angles, identical in their sharp grins, their easy arrogance.

But I see the real one. He’s stepping forward.

Not far, not fast, but enough. Enough for my pulse to stutter, for my instincts to rear up, whispering wrong, wrong, wrong.

The illusions don’t move. They fill the space between us, mirroring his stance, tilting their heads in eerie synchronization, forming an unbreakable wall that keeps me away from him.

From his brother.

Malachi watches from atop his monstrous hound, unbothered. Intrigued.

"That’s new," he muses, tapping a gloved finger against his knee. "You’ve gotten better, Silas. Almost impressive."

Silas' illusions smirk. "Shut up, Mal."

The shimmer appears a second later. I don’t know how to describe it, like a ripple in the air, bending the battlefield around them. A pocket of reality pulling away from the rest. The moment it appears, sound warps, becoming muted, hazy.

And then, Silas is in my head.