7 Deadly Instincts (The Sinfire Chronicles Book 1)

The awards ceremony didn’t matter. All in all, after all the challenges and all the Chaotica games, Gray’s team didn’t even place in the top three. It was the Fae taking home the golden victor medals, the remnants of Blythe’s team—minus Blythe and the two dead brothers—winning the silver slayer award, and the Wrath City Raiders getting stuck with the bronze survivor trophy.

Without Freek, the orcs laughed less and glared more. Of course, they hated Gray and his squad the most.

Four dead, including Ames, and it would’ve been five if Gray hadn’t sacrificed the game to save the troublesome Pamalee Thornpinch.

There was bathing and feasting and laughter and relief—the Soulshred was over.

It would be three months before the Reckoning and the end of the Testing.

Returning to Ruin Manor was bittersweet. Yellow, of course, was overjoyed to see them, and Rynn cried while she petted and held him. When Pinch came through the secret door under the steps, Yellow stiffened and went still.

A low growl—from the back of his throat—made everyone pause.

Pinch set down her trunk and stared into the dog’s eyes. “Hello, puppy.”

Settie had already her trunk down. “One of you take that to my room. And Yellow, if you’re going to bite her, do it quick. I’m tired after this past fucking week.”

Pinch knelt and put out a hand.

Yellow came over and sniffed, gave Pinch a long look, and then trotted back to Rynn for more pets.

The fae girl seemed genuinely sad with the dog’s cool response.

She started around in wonder. “All this time, you were living in Old Town. This can’t be legal. Crewel must know. He knows everything. Why hasn’t he said anything?”

Settie was gone and there was no one to ask.

Tomi grunted. “Maybe he thinks the demons are going to take care of us. As long as we aren’t poaching, we’re fine, right?”

Pinch frowned. “But you have poached. At least he has.”

Gray ignored her accusing finger. “There is no proof of that. Let’s get you to your room. I think our shredded souls need some rest.”

Pinch would be staying on the second floor, in the room next to Gray’s and across from Rynn’s, though she didn’t use it much anymore. She did put the two trunks there that Pinch had bought back from Froggy.

Rynn rushed him and threw him down onto the bed. “Now, Mr. No, we are going to have very loud, very sloppy sex, and you’re going to pound me into tomorrow. I have you. No one else has you, but I do.”

“You do, Mrs. Yes, you do.”

When it slid into her, it was heaven. their bodies were so tired, so spent, and yes, he felt like his soul had been shredded, but he found such comfort his bonded’s arms. Any mana he got from his lust, he shared with her.

And then, when both of them had reached the peak of their pleasure, he slept.

The house, even with the additional woman there, still felt empty without Ames.

He was going to fix that. He knew where she was. He merely needed to coax her home.

*

That night, he forced his way into the place of waters and stars. Most of the time, the dreams came when the came, but not this time. This time he wasn’t going to take no for an answer.

Every time he woke up and wasn’t with Oma, he re-focused his mind, thinking of Ames.

And then, before dawn, he made it there.

He was in the water near the island, though it was quiet there. The only sound was the water lapping up against the rocks of the island. Most of the time, he heard the women inside the shack, laughing, but that wasn’t the case.

All was quiet. He looked down into the ocean under his feet, hoping to see Ames’s face, but all he saw was the stars mirrored in the water under him.

“Oma!” he called out. “I’m here for Ames!”

“Of course you are, my little dreamer, but she might not want to see you. It’s up to her.”

Fear choked Gray. Would she want to see him? Was it wrong for him to try and coax her back to the world where she would only know suffering and death again?

“I don’t want to force her to do anything she doesn’t want,” Gray said. “Maybe this was a mistake.”

“Or it shows your love for her. You did the right thing choosing to lose. You saved that fae girl right when she needed saving, and I don’t mean the healing Captain Sevanya gave her. I mean in other ways.”

Gray sighed. “Pinch. Not even Yellow knows what to do with her. But I think she’s with us now, no matter what happens with Ames.” He paused. “Can you…can you tell me if Settie was there at the Fall of Alastria? Is she Little Dani Witherhand?”

“That is her story to tell,” the voice said. “Just like I can’t tell you what your story is going to be. I can just watch and wait and believe that it will all work out the way it was supposed to.”

“That sounds a lot like my life. I would expect to know all.”

“No one knows all, my precious dreamer. Not even the gods themselves. We are all perfect in our imperfections. Just like you. Just like with you, your core, and your meridians. You have done so well with your own journey.”

He felt a burning itch on his chest, on his ankles, and on his back. He had the two mana marks now, but he could feel the third one starting. It was all very uncomfortable

The sound of a door creaking open made him glance up.

Ames stood there, in the doorway, not in her First Field uniform but in a white gown. She had no emotion on there without a single expression on her face.

Gray knew enough not to try and rush over to her. That wasn’t how things worked in the place of water and stars.

“Ames,” he said quietly.

Her eyes found his.

Again, she didn’t react.

“It’s me. Gray. You don’t have to come back if you don’t want to. I know that Mrs. Quillswrath and the Widow Stone are trying to resurrect you, and even Captain Sevanya is helping. We miss you. We love you. But…”

Gray couldn’t talk. His throat and closed up with emotion. And he knew he was making noises in his sleep. Rynn was shushing him, in their bed in Ruin Manor, and he was dangerously close to waking up.

Ames saw his sorrow and her eyes slowly softened.

Gray felt the tear dribble down his cheek. “I know that life is fucked. I told you it can’t rain all the time, but it can, and I think some days, there is nothing but the rain. Life is suffering. I wouldn’t want you to suffer any more. You’ve done enough.”

The Quelling girl’s lips slowly curved into a smile, slowly, steadily, like the sun rising on a new day. Her eyes twinkled like the ocean of stars above them. “But…”

Gray was confused at first.. Then he too smiled. “But that’s only half the story, and that half comes from a lying mind. Life is life, big, dangerous, tragic, happy, and sleepy. It’s full of love and sex and food, and there are some days we will win and some days we will lose. We lost Soulshred Week, but do you know what? I don’t care.”

Ames closed her eyes and a tear slid down her face even as she smiled. “I told you she was the ice that burns.”

“You did. You told us a lot.”

Rynn was touching his face. It was morning back in the real world. Gray was about to wake up, he could feel it.

“She’s with you there in bed,” Ames said softly. “Rynnanatha. You brought trouble into her life. You brought rain, but she is happier for it, I think. If I returned, I would have to watch you two…”

“Not just watch,” Gray said. “We’ve felt it, both Rynn and I, how natural we are together. Rynn couldn’t go back to the room after you died, not for a long time, and when we were there, all she did was talk about how she misses you.”

Ames looked at me, shaking her head. “It would complicate your bond.”

He laughed. “With me, with how I am, it’s already complicated. I’ve been kissed by most every woman at First Field, including the captain. I can’t promise you that you’ll join Rynn and me, but I think you know the truth. I think I do.”

“And what’s the truth?” Ames asked.

He couldn’t answer, not for a long time, because he didn’t trust his voice not to break. “The truth is that Rynn and I will do all we can to make sure then when the rains come—and they will come—that we’ll hold you, we’ll love you, we’ll keep you as safe and warm and as loved as we can.”

Ames smiled. “And all it took was for me to die. It was a small price to pay for that, Grayson Fade. A very small price to pay indeed.”

She left the doorway and rushed out across the water.

Before she could touch him, Gray woke up.

Rynn was there looking down. “She’s awake, isn’t she?”

He nodded, and the he couldn’t help but cry.

Rynn held him as he sobbed, for the first time in his life, maybe. He wept for Ames, though he knew the truth about her resurrection. It had just worked, he knew it.

But it wasn’t just Ames it was for Blind John, and Lillian’s cruel letter, blaming him and hating him for stealing when she had everything and he had nothing.

He wept that Pinch was so fearful of never having friends while at the same time she pushed them all away with her vicious talk.

He wept for the world, for how troubled it was, how it created life while destroying it, and not just destroying it, but twisting it up and torturing it, like a boy burning an anthill.

He knew it was all just in his mind, his treacherous, treacherous mind, but he also knew he was an animal, and sometimes animals howled at the moon because of the pain and desire and loss.

When his storm of emotions left, Rynn kissed him.

“We’re going to keep Ames safe and warm and loved. In this house. In our lives. In this bed.”

“What about the bond?” he asked her. He didn’t comment on how she’d known what he’d said to Ames in the place of water of stars.

Rynn smiled. “There is that. But Gray, you’re asking the wrong question. What about the lust?”