A Light in the Flame (Flesh and Fire, #2)

by Jennifer L. Armentrout

“Gods of Divination?” I’d heard of the oracles, rare mortals who had lived long before my birth and were able to communicate directly with the gods without having to summon them.

“Sotoria didn’t belong to him then, and Seraphena doesn’t belong to him now.” Seraphena. I could count on one hand how many people called me by my full name, and none of them spoke it like he did. As if it were a prayer and a reckoning.

“What he means to say is that such a thing, a Primal of both Life and Death, is not meant to exist,” Nyktos said. “It would be unthinkable for the embers of both to thrive in one being. But if they could?” He gave a short laugh with a raise of his dark brows. “The kind of power they’d wield? It would be truly absolute. They could unravel realms in the same breath they created new ones.”

“Maia,” he said, speaking of the Primal of Love, Beauty, and Fertility. “I had her remove my kardia.” Penellaphe gasped, her eyes widening with shock. “Good Fates,” she whispered. “I have known none who’ve done that.” I was obviously missing something and also getting tired of asking questions. “What is a kardia?” “It’s the piece of the soul—the spark—that all living creatures are born and die with. It allows them to love another not of their blood irrevocably, selflessly.” Penellaphe swallowed. “It must have been terribly painful to have that torn from you. To truly be unable to love.”

He lowered his head even more, his mouth barely a breath away from mine. “I will gladly suffer anything Kolis dishes out as long as my blood is spilled instead of yours.”

“Heartmates usually only occur between two people whose unions are linked to some great purpose.”

“The gown you were in yesterday was a distraction,” he whispered, his gaze dropping to where the swells of my breasts strained against the black lace of the bodice. “But this one is rather indecent.” “As I said before, your failings to keep your gaze from straying is no reflection upon me.” “I would have to be made of stone for my gaze not to stray.” A strand of reddish-brown hair fell against his cheek as his chin tipped down. “But I’m only flesh and blood, and you are…” “What am I?” “You are flesh and fire.” “Then you should be careful,” I taunted, “lest you become nothing more than ember and ash.” Twisting

“Sera.” I thought I heard Nyktos whisper my name as I began to doze off. “You were never a ghost to me.”

“The poppies,” I whispered. “The poisonous, temperamental poppies that remind you of me.” “The powerful, beautiful poppies that also remind me of hope,” Nyktos replied, his thumb smoothing under my lower lip before returning to my hip. “Those poppies are the hope of life. The power of those embers. Proof that life cannot be defeated, not even in death.”

“I warned you once, purely out of amusement,” Nyktos drawled, tone soft and at complete odds with the words he spoke. “I will not warn you again. Speak to her one more time? Look at her? And I will shatter every bone in your cowardly body and then drag you into the Abyss to bury you so deep in the pits that it will take you a hundred years to claw your way out. Do you understand me?”