Silas
I stretch like a damn champion—arms overhead, back arched just enough to show off the goods. I make sure to groan obnoxiously as I roll my neck like I’m about to face off in a cage match with an actual god. Not that she’s looking.
Except she is.
Luna’s standing across the courtyard, hair pulled into some messy half-knot that’s unraveling from her morning sparring session with Riven, skin flushed, collarbone glistening like it’s been kissed by lightning. She’s all strength and soft chaos, and I’m trying so hard not to stare. I fail. Immediately. Spectacularly.
“What are you doing?”
she asks, deadpan.
I point both fingers at her like twin loaded pistols.
“Stretching to fight you. Obviously. Shadow-boxing is out. Finger-gunning is in.”
She lifts a single brow.
Just one.
It’s unfair how sexy judgment can be on her. And unfair how I want it.
“I’m warming up my most lethal weapons,”
I say, thrusting the finger guns forward again with a dramatic pew pew.
“Highly advanced. Calibrated to maximum flirt.”
Still nothing.
My fingers hang in the air between us like awkward little idiots, and she just blinks once, then tilts her head.
“That’s...that’s your opener?”
“Yes,”
I say, grinning.
“and also my closer. I’m a package deal, baby.”
Now she’s trying not to laugh. Her lips twitch. It’s beautiful. Evil. Irresistible.
She leans slightly to one side, arms crossing over her chest as she pretends to survey the scene like a bored instructor. “.”
“Yes?”
“Did you stretch specifically for a hypothetical battle with me…using finger guns?”
“I don’t like to go into any form of battle unprepared,”
I say solemnly.
“Besides, your last training session got way too sweaty. I’m just trying to outshine you in the sparkle department.”
Her mouth actually quirks. I feel like I’ve won a trophy made of sunfire.
“You think you can outshine me?”
“Oh, I know I can,”
I say, stepping closer.
“Want me to prove it? I’ve been practicing my slow-motion hair flips. Very dramatic. Extremely wind-reliant. May require fans and theme music.”
She snorts, which I pretend not to find completely adorable. She’s still flushed from training, eyes gleaming, and for a second, she forgets the world’s burning down around us. That’s the part I’m addicted to. Making her laugh in the middle of hell.
“Okay then,”
she says, finally lifting her hand, fingers raised.
I light up.
But then she fakes me out and uses her ‘guns’ to shoot me straight in the chest.
“Bang,”
she says, voice low and amused.
I clutch my chest and stumble backward like she’s actually hit me.
“You wound me, my sweet, sparkling wrath goddess.”
“Better than your cringe guns,”
she mutters, turning to grab a towel, but there’s softness in her voice now. A sweetness she doesn’t always let through.
I close the distance. Just enough to feel the heat rolling off her, not enough to touch.
“You know I’m completely in love with you, right?”
She turns back, all that faux-seriousness melting.
“Yeah, . I know.”
“And you love me too, obviously. Because look at me.”
She smirks, reaches up, and ruffles my hair. “I do.”
Gods.
I’d crawl through the Void again just to hear her say it like that.
I don’t kiss her. Not yet. The moment’s too light, too perfect to ruin with anything heavy. But I touch her wrist, gently, and hold her eyes with mine for a beat longer.
“You and me,”
I say.
“We make chaos look good.”
Her smile deepens, that rare, real one she only shows when she’s letting the weight slip for just a second. “We do.”
The bond between us pulses—warm, steady, mine—and I swear it hums with approval.
Then I slap her ass and run.
Because I’m still me.
She doesn’t chase me. A pulse zings down the bond, a quiet command wrapped in silk and steel—and I fly backwards through the air like some beautiful idiot in a tragic opera. And I commit. Because if I’m going down, I’m going down dramatically.
I twist mid-air with flair, shirt lifting just enough to expose my stomach—abs flexed, catching light like divine tragedy, hair artfully disheveled in the way that costs mortals thousands at salons.
I land sprawled in the grass, arms flung out like I’ve been struck by divine wrath. My expression is one of poetic betrayal. A single blade of grass kisses my cheekbone. I leave it there for ambiance.
She walks toward me slowly, a predator in sweat-slick skin and amused disapproval. Her shadow stretches over me, swallowing me whole before she even touches me. She stops just over my body and leans forward until her face is above mine, upside-down, hair spilling toward me like a curtain of ink.
Her voice is the sound of bad decisions whispered in the dark.
“Do you want to be strung up in a tree?”
“Depends,”
I say solemnly, lifting my head just enough to meet her gaze.
“are you planning to leave me there? Or worship me like the forest deity I clearly am?”
She exhales a laugh. It’s sharp. Soft. Dangerous.
“You are not a deity.”
“I could be.”
I raise one brow.
“Give me enough clones, a fog machine, some cultist robes—”
She cuts me off with a single look. And a gentle press of her foot on my stomach. Not enough to hurt. Just enough to remind me she’s the one with the power now.
I sigh like a martyr.
“Okay, wow. That’s hot. Foot kink? Unlocked.”
She steps off me. I groan in protest and prop myself up on one elbow, brushing imaginary dust from my shoulder like I haven’t just been publicly humbled by the girl I’m hopelessly obsessed with.
“You didn’t even try to run,”
she says, amused, folding her arms.
“I knew it wouldn’t matter,”
I reply.
“You always catch me eventually.”
There’s a flicker in her eyes. Something softer than the usual challenge. I see it. She knows I mean it. Not just physically. I mean she has me. All of me. And she always will.
She sits beside me instead of walking away. Close, but not touching. I let the moment linger. Let the quiet stretch. Because this is the real prize. Not the chaos. Not the quips. It’s being near her, when she doesn’t have to let me.
After a breath, I glance at her from the corner of my eye.
“You know, if you do string me up in a tree, I request only one thing.”
She glances over, skeptical.
“Dare I ask?”
“Angle me slightly west,”
I say, deadly serious.
“Better light for my abs.”
She groans, standing, but I hear the smothered laugh under it. That’s the real victory.
I follow her up, brushing grass from my back.
“You love me.”
“I do,”
she says, not missing a beat.
“Even if I sometimes regret it.”
“That’s fair,”
I say, slinging an arm around her shoulders.
“But just remember—if you ever lose your way, just follow the glitter trail I leave behind.”
She doesn’t shake me off.
She leans into me.
And my heart, the feral thing it is, claws at my ribs like it’s trying to get closer to hers.
She shifts up into stance, eyes narrowed in challenge, mouth parted in that way that makes me think of things I definitely shouldn’t during combat training.
Which is precisely the problem.
Because we’re supposed to be training. And I’m supposed to be teaching. And her fingers? Just brushed my stomach while reaching for a fake grab, and now my entire brain has short-circuited and I’m seriously considering whether I can die from this level of arousal and shame.
So naturally, I do what any mature, responsible mentor figure would do.
I stumble back like she’s slapped me. One hand dramatically pressed to my chest.
“Luna Veyd,”
I gasp.
“Are you feeling me up during combat?”
She blinks. Hard. “What?”
“You touched me,”
I accuse, pointing at her like she’s just committed high treason against the God of Boundaries—which, to be fair, is usually me, but that’s beside the point.
“That’s kind of the point of sparring,”
she says slowly, the corners of her mouth twitching like she’s trying very hard not to laugh.
“Was it?”
I narrow my eyes, circling her.
“Because it felt suspiciously intimate. There was… lingering. There was definite palm-to-ab contact. That was not regulation sparring.”
She snorts, and I take that as a victory. Because even if she does end up murdering me with Wrath, at least she’ll do it while smiling.
“I was trying to flip you,” she says.
“Well, mission accomplished—you flipped my entire will to fight,”
I say, throwing my hands up.
“Now I’m emotionally compromised. I need a support clone.”
I snap my fingers, and across the courtyard, one of my clones stumbles into existence mid-dance. Shirtless. Naturally. He points finger guns at us both, then proceeds to serenade a daisy.
Luna stares at him, then looks back at me.
“You’re unbelievable.”
“I’m in love, Luna,”
I say, chest heaving with theatrical despair.
“That makes me weak. Vulnerable. Swoony. You should be careful with that kind of power.”
“.”
“Yes, my moon goddess?”
“Shut up and teach me how to block a blow.”
“Rude,”
I murmur, but I step closer. And this time, I don’t make a joke about the way her skin glows in the heat or how she smells like sweat and divinity. I just reach for her hands, guide them gently into position.
Too gently. My fingers linger over hers. The contact burns in a way I secretly crave. Our bond hums, low and steady, an echo of how close we already are. I feel her pulse beneath my touch.
And just before she can call me out for being sappy, I grin.
“But if you try to grope me again mid-block, we’re gonna have to renegotiate this training agreement.”
She punches me in the stomach.
I make the sound of a dying hero. Collapse. “Abuse,”
I wheeze.
“She’s gonna kill me before I can tell her I love her again.”
“You already told me that.”
“Yes, but I haven’t made it weird yet today.”
“You just did.”
Perfect.
Hand-to-hand combat?
Yeah, no.
That’s Wrath’s department, and while I could teach her how to disarm a man with just her thighs, the second she puts her hands on me again, I’m not going to be a very good teacher. I’ll be a very naked one. Possibly arrested. Definitely moaning.
So I do the mature thing. The Orin thing.
I take a breath, lower my voice to that slow, patient drawl he uses when talking about the sacred inevitability of death or betrayal or existential longing, and gesture at a row of gnarled, half-dead trees like they hold all the answers.
“This,”
I say solemnly, “is Envy.”
Luna blinks, sweat glistening on her collarbone, brow furrowed.
“That’s…a tree.”
“A tree coveting the sunlight the others get,”
I explain, nodding wisely.
“See how it twists toward the light, choking out its neighbors? Classic Envy.”
She stares at the tree. Then at me. “.”
“I’m channeling Orin,”
I whisper, stepping closer.
“Be respectful. The ancient sin of envy cannot be learned through violence. It must be understood. It’s a feeling, Luna. A devouring thing. It doesn’t strike. It eats. Slowly.”
Her arms cross, but she’s biting the inside of her cheek to keep from laughing. Which means I win.
“Envy,”
I say, pointing to my face now.
“is watching you train with Riven and not being the one holding your wrist while you nearly break mine. It’s knowing you’re touching Elias, sleeping with him—talking with him—and not throwing him off a balcony because I love you more and you’re mine.”
Her breath stills.
And fuck, I said it too quiet, too honest, too raw.
So I smile again. Bright, ridiculous. Like I didn’t mean it. Like it was a joke, not a truth.
“But hey, who’s counting, right?”
I wink.
“Anyway, back to the lesson.”
I wave my hand, shadows curling like smoke beneath the grass, swallowing the dying light. The trees seem to lurch, lean closer.
“You want to master Envy?”
I murmur, stepping behind her. My voice drops low in her ear.
“Stop pretending you don’t want what you’re not supposed to have. Me. Power. All of it.”
She doesn’t move.
Good.
Because I’m not done.
I raise my hand, let mimicry stir beneath my skin—Elias’s stillness, Riven’s wrath, Orin’s steadiness. I could be any of them. I could be all of them. But when she finally turns to face me again, I don’t have to be.
Because she looks at me like I’m the only thing she sees.
Her fingers curl slightly at her sides. She wants to touch me again. I just might let her.
“Envy’s not a strike. It’s a slow bleed.”
I step around her, slow, deliberate, but there’s no hiding the hunger in my eyes. Not now.
She watches me like she’s not sure if I’m teaching her or circling her—and, to be fair, I’m not entirely sure myself.
“Most people think envy is wanting what someone else has,”
I murmur, drawing closer, letting my voice drop like molasses.
“But that’s not it. Wanting? That’s innocent. Harmless. Sweet, even. Envy is what comes after.”
She doesn’t blink.
I lean in until my breath is on her ear.
“Envy is decay. It rots. It takes something beautiful and makes it unbearable. Makes you need it, hate it, destroy it—just so no one else can have it.”
She swallows, throat tight. Her pulse flickers beneath her skin like a drum I’ve already memorized.
I step in front of her now, fingers flexing once—then letting go.
And I let it happen.
The mimicry splits wide in my chest. I don’t just tap into Envy—I become it. It licks out of me in a coiling, noxious rush. Like bile. Like smoke. It’s not just power—it’s a possession. It weaves around her, into her, before she even realizes it.
She gasps.
The shadows ripple under her feet. Her spine arches slightly, pupils blown wide.
I see the moment she feels it.
Me.
Her envy for Riven’s calm. For Elias’s snark. For Orin’s stillness. For the power she holds but doesn’t understand. For the girl she was before all this—the one who didn’t carry gods inside her skin.
“You feel that?”
I whisper, stepping in until her chest brushes mine.
“That’s you. That’s mine inside you. That’s what you bind. What you anchor.”
She’s breathing fast now, lips parted, and her fingers curl like she might claw it out of herself.
But I don’t stop it.
I push.
Envy floods her, colors the world—saturates it. Everything she’s hidden starts to rise: the ache when I laugh with someone else, the pulse in her gut when I flirt with the others, the way her eyes linger just a little too long on Lucien when she thinks no one sees.
It all becomes too loud.
“Make it stop,”
she chokes, voice strained.
“No,”
I say, firm, quiet.
“You have to feel it. Envy isn’t something you wield—it’s something you survive. You either master it, or it eats you alive.”
Her knees almost buckle, but I catch her.
Not gently. I press my palm to her chest, right over her heart, and let it all drain back into me in a flood of shadow and gold. Her envy. Mine. The tangled mess we are.
When her eyes meet mine again, she’s trembling.
But she’s still standing.
I smile, breathless, feral.
“Congratulations, princess,”
I whisper, voice like a sin wrapped in silk.
“You didn’t drown.”
But gods, I almost wanted her to.
I am many things. Idiot. Flirt. Collector of abs and bad decisions. But beneath all that, I’m something far more dangerous.
And I’ve never shown her.
Not this part.
I shouldn’t.
But she’s standing like she’s not afraid of anything—not even me—and gods, that’s exactly why I want to ruin her with it.
So I do.
I lift my hand slowly, let my fingers hover just above her jawline—not touching. Not yet. My voice dips low, breath warm.
“Want to know something darker?”
She nods, silent.
I brush my fingertips along her throat. Just enough contact. Just enough skin. And that’s all it takes.
The leeching starts.
Shadow licks out of me like a predator. It doesn’t explode—it slithers. A black tendril of want, of hunger, curling beneath her skin. It sinks into her with an intimacy that isn’t physical, but existential. It drinks from her, just a sip, just enough to taste the heat of her life. The magic inside her. The echo of the others bonded to her. Their powers are there, layered and wild and humming.
But hers?
Hers is ripe.
It pulses like a living thing. Gold and wicked and so close to snapping.
And I feel it.
All of her.
Her desire. Her ache. Her exhaustion. Her love. And her darkness.
She gasps like I’ve touched something sacred—and maybe I have. Her hands slam against my chest, not to push me away but to anchor herself.
Her eyes are wide. Dazed.
“What—what is this?”
“My other talent,”
I murmur, mouth tilted into a grin that’s not even playful anymore.
“Shadow Leech. By touching someone, I can sap their energy. Steal their strength. Fuel myself.”
I press closer, let the shadow stretch between us, curl around her ribs like it belongs there.
“But I’ve never used it on you. Not even once. Not until now.”
Her breath is shallow, her pupils blown wide, and I see it in the way her body shakes—not from weakness, but from the sheer weight of what she feels. What she’s tasted.
“Why now?”
she whispers.
I drop my hand, let the shadows fade. Let her come back to herself.
And I meet her eyes, serious in a way I rarely am.
“Because you needed to know what I really am. What you’re tied to.”
She steps forward, voice hoarse.
“And what is that?”
I smile.
“Sin, sweetness. Drenched in shadow. Dripping with need. And just a little obsessed with you.”
Her lips twitch, but she doesn’t laugh. Because she felt it.