Page 50 of The Never List
“About my powers or about the potential for attack?”
“Both,” I say, though I know I’m being ridiculous. I can’t even really explain the rising anger myself. But there’s something inside me that’s furious with him for leaving me behind.
“I’ve known you all of two days,” he says, an edge to his tone I’ve not heard before. “I had no idea how you would react. The others never wanted to know about Legend business. They avoided it like the plague it can be—”
“I’m not them!” I toss the bandages at his chest, and his eyes flare wide. “I’llneverbe them.” My entire body is shaking now, adrenaline pushing me right out the washroom door and into his bedchamber. I fully intend to stomp back to my room, but I run into Kal’s chest before I can even make it to the doors. I didn’t even see him appear in front of me.
I splay my palms on his bare skin, and heat soars through my blood at the contact.
“What are you more upset about?” he asks, gently clutching my wrists, holding me there when I try to move away. “That you didn’t know I could heal, or that I didn’t warn you about the dangers—”
“You left me behind,” I cut him off, the truth making my throat raw. “You left me…” Tears well up behind my eyes, angry and grief-stricken, and it hits me like a bolt of lightning.
The last time I was left behind, I lost Erin. I lost the other half of my heart, my sister, my soul’s twin. And I may not care for the Legends like I do my sister, but our survival is linked, and they left withoutanypromises of returning.
“Rylee.” He sighs my name, the tone soft as he releases my wrists. “I didn’t mean to hurt you,” he says, “but I’ll always do whatever it takes to keep you out of danger.”
I raise my chin, allowing a little of my true self to seep through. “I’m not some dainty princess,” I say. “I’ve been taking care of myself for a very long time. If you’re looking for someone to coddle, you can blame Jax for choosing wrong.” My emotions are a tangled mess. I can’t separate my feelings, and I have no idea if the connection I feel to him is real or some creation concocted out of desperation.
I move to leave, but a strong, muscled arm cuts in front of my path. Kal’s hand slides along my ribs, and he shifts so he’s in front of me again. “Nothing about you is dainty,” he says, smoothing that hand up and down, eliciting chills everywhere he touches. “And Jax didn’t choose wrong. Iknowhe didn’t.” He skims his other hand over my hip, eyeing the oversize tunic I’m wearing.
Everywhere he touches aches. Everywhere he looks leaves a brand on my skin.
“It’s so early in our time together,” he says. “I didn’t know you’d be so worried about us.”
Mirren said no one cared to worry about them before, and that statement hits deeper at his words.
“Well,” I say, swallowing hard. “I was. And I’m not some breakable thing. I can handle the Faders or any other kind of trouble as well as you can.” Well, maybe notaswell—I’m not anywhere near as powerful as the part-god Legends—but I can hold my own.
“Mirren told you about the Faders,” he says, sighing.
“Yes, and she told me that they’ve been able to wound you more than once. And now you’re telling me their weapons stop you from healing. I think I’m more than justified in—in worrying that one of these times, you might not come back. That you’ll die out there, and I’ll be trapped here, and I won’t know, and I won’t be able to do a thing.” I rest my forehead on his chest, then turn my head and press my ear to his heart. “I thought there wasn’t anything that could hurt you,” I whisper.
Kal laughs sadly and wraps his arms around me, kissing the top of my head. “There never has been before, but we’re…we’re not at our full strength.”
I pull back to look at him again. “What do you mean?”
Kal gazes off to the side, folding his sadness away. “The tribute we pay our mothers—the power we give them, to maintain the wards—without our mate, it’s begun to cost us.”
“But why?” I ask.
“When our mothers chose to mate with our fathers, they bestowed them each with a drop of their infinite power, making them immortal. But soon they learned that, through their new magical bond, their mates could siphon and use one another’s powers at will. It created a relentless power struggle between the kings, which our mothers frowned upon.” He runs a hand through my hair, and I shiver, but his eyes stay distant. “Not to mention, siphoning too much from one another nearly killed them a few times.
“By the time our mothers bore us, they wanted no such life for us. They used their collective power to suppress our gifts, magically weaving locks in our souls that can be opened by one mate and one mate only. Someone who wouldchooseus and act as our tether to Lumathyst. Someone who would balance us and bind us together, forestall any fight between us, and ground us when our powers reach their full potential. Only with our fated mate did our mothers think us protected enough to fulfill our destinies.”
He finally looks at me again, and he must see something in my face, because his brow smooths immediately. “But that is our concern, not yours. We don’t even fully understand the Faders’ agenda yet, and it’s just as likely that we won’t need our full powers to defeat them. It’s not your fight.”
Realization washes over me like a bucket of ice-cold water. The Choosings, the yearly event…therealreasoningbehind it. And goddess, if people knew? If their enemies knew? They’d likely use the information to sabotage the Choosing. They’d use it to ensure the princes never reach full power, never ascend the thrones. The Legends need a mate for so much more than a royal agenda. They’re willing to use me just as much as I’m using them.
But I’m not… There is no way I’m their fated mate. I snuck into that event with the sole purpose of finding my sister. There was no hope in my heart for becomingtheirs, and yet, if I reveal those truths, I’ll be imprisoned or executed for my lies. Despite all that, there’s something deeper, an instinct screaming at the notion that Kal was harmed tonight, that anyone harm the Legends I’m now tied to, and I can’t ignore it.
I trail my hand up Kal’s rigid abdomen and over his chest, unable to resist with him so close. He smells so good,feelsso good against me, and there is the relief inside me that he’s here…safe.
“If it’s yours,” I say, “if it’s the Legends’ fight, then it’s mine.” I might not be their fated mate—and guilt springs up that I might even be preventing them from finding her and reaching their full power by continuing to stay with them—but I can’t trade my life to appease that guilt. They’ll have another Choosing after this one, and I’ll do what I can to protect them until they have another chance at finding their true match.
Kal’s blue eyes flare with emotion as he snakes his arms around my waist, hauling me closer. “Where did you come from, Rylee Gray?”
I bite back a grin. “You really don’t want to know,” I try to joke, but I feel the truth of the statement in my heart.
