Page 155 of The Never List
Axl and Kal aren’t far behind, each of their faces mirroring my own grief.
“She’s ours,” I say, holding the bottle toward them. “I’m going to get her back.”
“Like fuck you are,” Axl says. “Not without me.” He grabs a vial out of the box.
“These are the last vials,” Pierce says, ever the logical voice.
“They are.” My entire body shakes with adrenaline. “You can stay. All of you. Try again another time if I don’t succeed. But Rylee is my mate. I know it. There is no one else for me. Either I get her back or I die.”
“She’sourmate.” Kal uncorks his own bottle. “I don’tneed another chance.”
“I don’t, either,” Pierce says as he looks at each of us. “We drink this, and there’s a good chance we may be lost to trials that were not meant for us.”
“You don’t have to do this,” I reiterate, looking at my friends. “You could stay behind, remain here in case the worst happens—”
“Not a chance,” Axl says. “Legends live together, and we die together.”
I nod and bring my bottle to my lips, my friends doing the same as we all drink the elixir that was meant solely for a potential mate. But I don’t give a shit. This took Rylee to the goddesses? Then it’d better fucking take me, too.
The liquid burns down my throat, feeling like I swallowed a bottle of razor blades, but the pain is nothing compared to the grief ripping my heart to shreds.
I glance at my friends one last time before I feel the weight of a thousand universes fall atop me.
My back hits the floor, and I manage to roll to my side, my heavy eyes on Rylee as I reach for her—
48
Jax
“You know, son, I have always loved your flair for drama.” I hear my mother’s voice, and suddenly I’m conscious again.
I stand in an intensely bright space that goes on forever in all directions.
I try to hold my hand up to block the blaze from my eyes, squinting against it, but there’s no escaping it.
“Mother?” I step toward the sound of her voice, and then she’s there, standing among my friends’ mothers, three of whom are looking down at something lying on a marble slab in front of them.
“Rylee,” I say when I notice the body on the slab.
It’s only then that I realize I’m not the only one who said her name.
I race toward her alongside Axl, Pierce, and Kal. All four of us running toward our mate, who lies at the feet of our mothers.
“Axl,” Axl’s mother says as he reaches the marble slab first, then Kal, then Pierce, and then me, skidding to a stop. My grief overtakes me once more as I see her lying there…not breathing…not moving.
“She’s strong enough. She loved us forus. And you denied her immortality?” I ask, anger drenching my toneas I look at my mother, who’s every bit as devastatingly beautiful as she is in my memory. I point to Rylee. “You give her back to us,” I demand.
My mother gives me a chiding look, and one tilt of her head has me dropping to my knees, her power so all-encompassing, I feel like I’m being stretched in every direction at once.
“Wedid not do this,” she says in a tone I’ve never heard before.
She’s angry. So fucking angry.
Her power recedes, and she sighs as I drag myself back to standing.
“If you didn’t do this, then who did?” Kal’s eyes are on his mother, who’s looking at him with nothing but pure adoration and love. She radiates every bit of goodness that’s in Kal’s heart.
“We’re not allowed to say certain things,” the goddess Neph says, looking at each of us pitifully. “There’s a delicate balance that we must not upset.”
