Page 45

Chapter

Thirty

LUST

I ran until I couldn’t breathe.

Then I ran further.

The world around me blurred—woods, stone, shadows—none of it real enough to touch. Not with the fire still raging inside my chest. Not with her still burning beneath my skin.

Wrath.

I didn’t just take her—I was bound to her.

All of us, but I was the first. We all felt the snap of it, even if they didn’t know what it meant.

Well, maybe G did. And Sloth.

It wasn’t just sex, it was magick so old it didn’t have rules—just reactions. And I was the one she’d opened to first. Fully.

Now I couldn’t shut her out.

Not her thoughts, not her feelings. Not even the way her body still hummed like it was crying out for more. Her power crackled along my nerves, hot and erratic. I’d always been good at controlling myself—at mastering the energy I embodied. But this?

This wasn’t lust. This was possession.

I collapsed in a clearing, dirt digging into my palms as I braced against the earth, trembling.

Sweat slid down my spine in rivulets, but it did nothing to cool me.

The magick of the bond—the golden burn of it—flared through my blood like a brand, burning and writhing in my veins like a living creature as it struggled to either acclimate, or escape.

Every heartbeat was a throb of magick. Every breath tasted like her.

My head dropped forward.

Her voice whispered across my mind.

Not words—just emotions.

Worry. Curiosity.

I felt a surge of her power.

Guilt.

She was trying to suppress it, but the bond didn’t lie. It didn’t care if we were ready.

A laugh cracked from my throat, wild and bitter.

“Of course you’re sorry,” I whispered to the empty forest. “But it’s too late for sorry, sweetheart. You chose me.”

The clearing was quiet, too quiet. Even the wind held its breath. My breath fogged in the air, though the night wasn’t cold. It was like the forest around me sensed the storm brewing beneath my skin and dared not come closer.

Then the earth pulsed beneath my knees.

And quite suddenly, I was surrounded.

“Finally!” Pride bit out, irritated.

Envy was panting, out of breath as he bent over, but not before slapping me hard on the back.

“Damn, she made you faster. So fucking fast. Not...fair.”

Sloth rolled his eyes. Wait, Sloth was out of the house?

“Stop being dramatic. We shifted most of the way here. You only ran about forty yards,” Greed chuckled.

Envy shot him a dark look.

“Lust, what are you doing?”

Unconsciously I turned to her voice, everything else narrowing until the only thing that mattered was her.

Wrath.

“I...don’t know,” I admitted.

Greed snorted. Envy elbowed him in the side and he crumpled, groaning in pain.

“Well, I think the bond is unconsciously affecting you. This is a hub I’ve been keeping an eye on for a few months. Your trackers could be here.”

I frowned. “You mean...the fae traffickers?”

Pride grinned. “Wrath is dead-set on using some of her new excess magick on them. Her wants must have unconsciously influenced you through the bond, because here you are.”

“And here we are,” Sloth added helpfully.

“Here we are, indeed,” I grumbled.

Not that I was mad.

The heat of Wrath's magick was like a compass in my chest, keeping me grounded and pointing the way forward. She was too powerful to hide, too raw to shield, and something had to be done with the excess magick.

Killing two birds with one stone, as the humans like to recite.

“They’re nearby, you say?” I asked.

Alone I’d never try something so foolhardy. We tried to stay out of fights as Sins. But this time? I could. I would.

No, we could. Together. All seven of us.

“Look.”

She pointed to the top of a hill in the distance, where a modest cabin stood.

“Let me do this alone.”

Greed made a sound of disbelief in the back of his throat but Envy put a hand out to his chest, stopping him.

Sloth accepted his fate, folding his arms over his chest and sitting down on a tree stump. But I was never one to simply go along with everyone else.

She told me not to follow her with her eyes; eyes that cracked with fury she could barely contain. Wrath had been through fire, leaving her with magick and vengeance with an edge sharpened by grief and rage.

Wrath stalked toward the cabin with fire in her blood.

I gave her space but followed as she stalked up to the non-descript, run-down wooden cabin.

There were no wards, guards, or...anything.

Then again, if you were this far out in the middle of the woods, it was for a reason.

Magick would probably act like a beacon in a place there wasn’t supposed to be any.

Moss and algae covered the north side of the cabin, a layer of dust and dead bugs in the windowsill. That was all I managed to take in before Wrath kicked in the front door like an avenging angel on a warpath.

There was a man inside—no, a werewolf! He barely got two words out before he shifted into a wolf, lunging at as with a roar.

Wrath didn’t even blink as she held her hand out, an invisible force slamming him back against the wall and holding him there.

He whined.

A werewolf makes no sense. Wrath had said they were human traffickers. Supernaturals wouldn’t traffick other supernaturals … would they?

My heart sank. I wasn’t stupid.

“You have five seconds,” Wrath demanded, stepping over the threshold, “to tell me where the others are.”

He growled, then bones snapped and tendons ripped as Wrath bared her teeth at him, her magick forcing him back into his human form. He slumped to the ground on all fours, shaking.

“W-what others?” he stammered.

“Wrong answer,” she snarled.

She raised her hand and the entire room ignited—not in flames, but in red light, thick and humming, curling around her wrist like a living thing. The werewolf screamed and fell off the chair, twitching and writhing in agony on the musty wooden floor.

She stepped over him and kept walking.

“HEY! What–”

“Stop her!”

“Call–”

Three traffickers total, all werewolves.

For a moment everyone froze in a standoff. Wrath frowned, head tilting to the side as if she recognized one of them.

“Kill her!” One of them uttered, but another tried to run. Wrath simply pointed—and the front door slammed shut so hard it cracked the frame. Another reached for a knife. She glanced at it, and the blade rusted to powder midair.

The third dropped to his knees. All of them found themselves unable to shift into their wolf forms.

“There’s a bunker,” he panted. “Please—please don’t kill me.”

“Then show me,” she said, voice quiet but absolute. “And don’t lie. I’ll know.”

I trailed behind, keeping to the shadows. This was her stage; I was just the stagehand in the back, ready if shit went sideways.

He led her to a trapdoor beneath the rug. Stupid cliché. I could already smell the enchantments below—wards meant to keep things in, not out. The rug shimmered, a powerful dampening charm on it that hid the magick of the bunker itself.

Odd. That was a high-level enchantment. Where had werewolves come across it?

Wrath tore through the enchantments and the door like wet paper.

A foul smell emanated from down below, wafting up to us. Below lay utter darkness. The man tried to edge away, but I grabbed him by the scruff of his neck and threw him down at Wrath’s feet.

“Where are you off to? You’re going down,” she whispered to him, voice deadly. “You two as well.” She gestured to the other two traffickers.

They made an odd squeak but jumped down, as together we descended into the dim, disgusting bunker. And that’s when I saw them.

Cages.

Rows of them.

A goblin boy, face bruised and knees tucked to his chest. Next to him was a selkie child with her pelt locked in a glass case above her cage.

A dryad girl with bark-skin cracking at the edges cried when she saw us, shirking away.

An incubus no older than fifteen stared mournfully at us, chained in iron.

Magickal creatures. Children.

Rage pulsed in my throat, and for the first time I wished I was a vampyre like Envy or G, so I could have fangs to rip out the mens’ throats.

No, my incubus heritage would have to be enough.

I shot the incubus boy a look, receiving a small nod in return: a promise.

Wrath didn’t scream. Her body vibrated as she looked each child in the eye, the human already on the ground and begging for his life. She ignored him and raised her hand—and the locks dissolved, one by one, in synchronized bursts of molten light.

“Out,” she said softly. “All of you. You’re free.”

The kelpie bolted, smashing the case with her pelt and shooting up the trapdoor. The incubus hesitated, like he couldn’t quite believe it. The goblin boy looked at her like she was made of starlight.

The trafficker whimpered behind us. “We—we were just selling them to collectors—nobles need mana-blooded servants, it’s the market?—”

He didn’t get to finish.

Wrath turned.

Her eyes were twin furnaces, her hair lifting in invisible wind. The trafficker staggered back, sobbing now.

“No one owns them,” she said. “Not anymore.”

And she burned him.

Not fire—something older. His body dissolved into red ash before he could scream, the air tasting of copper and stormlight. The other two traffickers scrambled, weeping, begging.

She left them alive.

Barely.

“I want them to remember,” she muttered.

The bunker shuddered as her power rippled outward. The two left alive were slammed into one of the cages just vacated, the door slamming shut. Wrath reached out with her hand and bent the metal, twisting it so it would be impossible for them to escape.

“We’re leaving.”

I placed a hand on the wall to steady myself.

I blinked and suddenly we were in the clearing outside. The children were surprisingly huddled together, wide-eyed and shaking but free.

The dryad girl was helping the selkie roll her pelt up into her arms. The incubus flinched from my gaze at first, until I crouched beside him.

“You’re safe now, little flame. I swear it. I will return you to your clan.”

Wrath stood at the center of it all—silent, blazing, alive. She didn’t need a crown. The night bent around her.

I walked up beside her, slow, deliberate. I didn’t speak. Not until she breathed out, like a long-held scream had finally left her lungs. Silently my brothers came up behind her, slowly surrounding her with support.

“Feel better?” I asked.

“No,” she said, heading tilting to the side.

She closed her eyes, and the cabin behind us erupted in flames.

Wrath sighed. “That’s better.”

She walked away.

Envy whistled. Greed grinned. Sloth stared open-mouthed at her and all the children.

“Do we take them back to the manor?”

Her shoulders dropped, just barely. I caught her arm before she could stumble.

“I’ll carry you if I have to,” I said. “You don’t get to save the world and then faceplant into the mud.”

She snorted. “Is that your version of affection?”

“It’s the Lust version. Limited emotional availability, unlimited physical support.”

She didn’t smile. But she didn’t pull away either.

Behind us, the children gathered closer, unsure what to do next.

“Come with us to our home. We will contact your families,” she promised them.

“And you?” I asked lowly. “Where’s Wrath going next?”

Her eyes gleamed in the dark.

“Wherever there’s something left to burn.”

Sloth yawned but his eyes flared with interest as he took in the children.

“Let’s each grab one. Meet you there?”

He gently reached out toward the incubus, who shot a terrified look at me. I nodded, and he relaxed into Sloth’s grip. They disappeared.

Envy gave Wrath a slight nod of his head, and offered his arm to the dryad. She frowned, but took it. They also disappeared.

“Guess it’s you and me, aye?” Greed joked, bowing in front of the selkie. She giggled, and disappeared with him in a small swirl of smoke.

The goblin looked at us, hope in his large eyes.

“Alright, let’s–”

BOOM.

The house exploded, a wave of power exploding out toward us in a shockwave so fast that I barely had time to grab the goblin and Wrath before it hit.

Agony wreaked havoc on my body as I absorbed most of the blow, every nerve on my body lighting up like a damn firework.

I staggered and fell to my knees. Wrath’s terrified face floated above me, her lips moving but no sound coming out.

Everything blurred in front of me. If it hadn’t been for the extra magick of our bond, I’d probably be unconscious.

Well, give me a few minutes and I’ll get there.