All Chapters of Ashes to Desire : Chapter 31 - Chapter 40

I watched her eyelids flutter like dying moths as consciousness crawled back into her body. The warehouse around us creaked with ancient complaints, but all I could focus on was the way her chest rose and fell with each shallow breath. My hand hovered over her shoulder, afraid to touch yet unable to pull away. I'd seen her die before, not this version of her, but others across time. The knowledge sat in my gut like a stone, hard, cold, and undeniable.Ember's eyes finally opened, and amber irises caught what little light filtered through the broken windows. Recognition flickered across her face when she saw me, followed immediately by pain."Easy," I said, my voice rougher than I intended. "We got knocked around pretty good back there."According to the faded signage outside, the warehouse had once been a textile mill. Now, it was just another skeleton of the old world—all rusted machinery, dust, and forgotten dreams, perfect for hiding. I'd chosen it because the thick concrete walls

The air in the warehouse thickened as Ember's power flared. Dust particles ignited in tiny pops of light around her, like fireflies with death wishes. The temperature climbed so rapidly that I could see heat waves distorting the air, making the walls and floor ripple like disturbed water. Metal pipes along the ceiling began to glow dull red, and the concrete beneath our feet radiated heat through my boots. I should have backed away. Every instinct honed through years of hunting creatures exactly like her screamed at me to retreat, to find cover, to reach for the iron-tipped dagger strapped to my thigh. Instead, I moved closer.Lena swore and stumbled backward, her survival instincts sharper than mine. "Hail, what the hell are you doing?"I ignored her. The heat pressed against my skin like physical hands, pushing me back. My eyes watered, and my lungs protested with each breath, but I kept moving forward until I reached Ember. Her entire body glowed now, light pulsing beneath her skin

The quiet after the fire was always the hardest part.I lay there, my skin still warm from the energy I’d released, every nerve humming like it hadn’t decided whether to rest or burn again. My thoughts didn’t settle either; they just spun, pulling fragments of memory and flashes of lives I wasn’t meant to remember, not like this.They weren’t just dreams anymore. They were real. Tangible. Mine.And there were so many of them.Not ten. Not twenty... hundredsFaces, voices, emotions, all layered beneath my skin like buried embers. I saw Dain in more than a few of them, and his smile was different every time. In some lives, he was a protector. In others, he was something closer. And in every version, there was one constant: his betrayal came too soon. I pressed a hand to my chest, half expecting to feel the weight of all those lives physically pushing against my ribs. I’d told Hail once that this started when I was seventeen. But I was wrong. So wrong.Seventeen was just the age I remem

I woke before the sun. Not that much of it is left these days. The clouds hung heavy, thick with ash and smoke, like even the sky feared what was coming.Hail was awake, too. He didn’t speak or move, but I felt him watching me.Neither of us dared to talk about what had happened, not yet. It was too fragile, too complicated. I didn’t even know what to call it. Desire? Comfort? Something older than both?All I knew was that the way he looked at me still lingered in my bones.I sat up, pulling the rough blanket tighter around my shoulders, and stared out the window. The warehouse was quiet, too quiet. Even Lena was silent, somewhere beyond the far wall, maybe giving us space, perhaps just avoiding the inevitable.My skin tingled, and not from the cold. My power felt different now, like it had finally woken up—not just to burn but to see and feel.And gods, it felt everything.The trees outside rustled. Or maybe that was something else.I closed my eyes, breathing deeply, and listening.

His name was carved in the stone. Over and over again.Dain Castros.I knelt beside the weathered column, my fingertips tracing each letter like they might whisper something if I just touched them the right way. They didn’t. They were silent. Still. Cold.But the ache in my chest told me enough.He’d been here. Or someone had written his name to lure me. Either way, it worked.Hail stood just behind me, silent but tense, a living statue with one hand on his blade. I didn’t need to look at him to know what he was thinking. What if this was a trap? What if we’d walked straight into it?“What does it mean?” Lena asked from the shadows.I shook my head. “It means he remembers.”I didn’t say the rest.It means he’s playing with me.The stone didn’t lie. There was no mistaking the etchings, old but deliberate. It repeated like a prayer. Or a curse. Over and over, Dain Castros. Dain Castros. Dain Castros.My hand curled into a fist. My breath caught in my throat.This was a message. Not to H