A Fire in the Flesh (Flesh and Fire, #3)

“I appreciate your denial. I do.” He rose at the waist, shifting his weight to the hand next to my curled knee. “Your life could’ve been so fucking different. Your family never would’ve punished you. You wouldn’t have had to feel as if you were alone—never allowed to experience what most take for granted. You wouldn’t have felt like a monster. My apologies were and will never be enough. I could’ve—”

“Stop,” I pleaded. “Listen to me. I’m not going to lie, Ash. I wish you’d made a different choice, but the one you made doesn’t make you a coward. It makes you stronger than anyone I know.”

His mouth opened.

“It does,” I insisted. “You sacrificed so much to protect me. More than I think you even realize.”

A lock of hair fell over his cheek as his chin lowered. His eyes closed. “You’re too understanding—accepting. Under all that toughness, you’re too kind.”

“I don’t know about all of that, but what I do know is that you’re not a coward. You did what you believed was best with the knowledge you had. It isn’t your fault.” I flattened my hand against his cheek. “If the Fates hadn’t decreed that no one could speak of what Eythos did, you would’ve made different choices. All of us would have.”

Ash nodded slowly. As I eyed him, I sensed there was more. What? I didn’t know. In all honesty, I wasn’t sure how I even knew there was more. Like before, it was almost like the knowledge or awareness simply formed in my mind. It reminded me of…

A shaky breath left me. What had Kolis said about Eythos? About the Primal of Life? That he had foresight? Intuition. Ash’s father hadn’t been born with it. He’d received it upon his Ascension.

Holy crap, did that mean I was now a know-it-all? Because if so, I would be way more obnoxious than ever.

But none of that mattered right now.

Ash did.

I drew my fingers along his shoulder, letting the unknown knowledge of there being more to what Ash said come to me. It wasn’t hard. I just didn’t think about what came to mind. I spoke it instead. “Did…did that dream or vision show you anything else?”

He cleared his throat. “It showed me what happened after you died. I saw the realms die—both mortal and that of the gods, and they…” His eyes met mine. “They died at my hands.”

The words he’d spoken right before he Ascended me… I knew he’d been speaking the truth then, and I heard that truth even now. Felt it.

“I had my kardia removed because I knew you were the one who would one day wreck me,” he rasped. “And only one thing could cause such agony, such destruction from a god or a Primal of Death.” His eyes searched mine. “That vision showed me that I’d fallen in love with you, and that it wasn’t Kolis who ended the realms. It was me. I ended them because I lost you.”

“Ash,” I whispered.

“And I thought removing my kardia would save you and the realms.” A harsh laugh punched out of him. “But in reality, it brought the realms within mere minutes of destruction. And maybe I read that vision wrong. Maybe it was trying to warn me not to do it. I have no idea. But…” His eyes glimmered. “But I still fell, Sera. Hard and fast. Irrevocably. Even without my kardia, I fell in love with you.”

“You did.” A tremor went through me. “Now, there is something I want to tell you. When I said I thought I’d die without knowing what your love felt like? I was wrong. Even if I had died—”

Eather pulsed in the veins of his cheeks. “I don’t want to talk about you dying.”

“I know, but what I’m saying is that you’ve proven to me, many times over, that you love me,” I said. “It was in every one of your actions, even if you never spoke the words. I knew when you held me in the lake that if what you felt wasn’t love, it was something even stronger—better. We just didn’t know it was possible.”

“It shouldn’t be.” He pressed his lips to my cheek. “There is only one thing I can think of that would make it possible. We’re of the same soul.” He drew back, leaving our faces inches apart. “It’s the only thing that could’ve made removing the kardia utterly meaningless.”

“Of the same soul?” I sat back. “Like mates of the heart?”

Ash nodded.

With everything that had happened, I’d totally forgotten about the dreams. “That was how we were able to walk in each other’s dreams?”

“Why I could connect in some way to you while in stasis. I think so.” His lashes swept down. “It wasn’t the embers or that you’d fed from me.”

“I know we talked about this in the cavern,” I said, “but I never knew if it was true or not.”

“To be honest, I didn’t either.” He drew his bottom lip between his teeth. “Mates of the soul—or of the heart—are even legend among us. Something rare the Fates were supposedly involved in.”

The Fates… A memory or piece of knowledge flickered through my mind, moving too fast for me to grasp at the moment. I shook my head slightly. “What do you mean?”

His brows furrowed. “It’s said that when the Arae look upon the threads of fate and see all the many different possibilities of one’s life, they can sometimes see what may come of the love between two or more souls. And in that union, they see possibilities that can reshape the realms by either creating something never seen before or ushering in great change,” he explained, running his thumb over the golden swirl on my hand. “And when they see that one thread, they are forbidden to intervene in the affairs of those souls, as they believe the bond between them cannot be circumvented. So, not even death of the body or the heart and soul—the kardia—can break such a connection.” His gaze returned to mine. “And the joining of our souls has brought up something never seen before. A Queen of the Gods.”

My lips parted. If what had been said about mates of the heart was true, then it explained how Ash could love.

How he’d been able to love me this whole time.

Something Holland said floated through my mind. “Love is more powerful than the Fates,” I murmured. “If the Arae are not supposed to meddle in the affairs of mates of the heart, then how was Holland allowed to interact with me for so long? And do what he did?”

Ash’s lips quirked up. “I have a feeling Holland really likes to push that fine line he walks between interfering and casually observing.”

“Yeah.” Something tugged at my memories, but whatever it was existed on the fringes. “I hope I get to see him again.”

“Liessa,” Ash drawled. “If you want to see Holland again, you can. You’re the true Primal of Life. You can summon the Fates, remember? There will be little you cannot do.”

“Little I cannot do?” My eyes widened. “That…that’s actually kind of scary.”

“Yeah.” Ash grinned. “Yeah, it is.”

I started to laugh, but something struck me—something huge. The essence of life had been fully restored, ceasing the slow death of the embers that had started the moment I was born, along with the consequences of placing them into a mortal bloodline. That meant…

Even though that odd, uncanny sense of knowing told me the answer, I needed to see it for myself. I jerked upright and scrambled off the bed.

“Sera?” Concern filled Ash’s voice.