Page 10 of Returned to the Vissigroth
“Get us to Leander,” he ordered. Instead of putting the palmtop back, he lifted it and turned it to me. “May I… show you something?”
With a sweep of his hand, he conjured up a series of images on it. At first, I thought it was just a feed from the ship’s external cameras—bleak skies, harsh mountain ranges—but then a sequence began to play, the grainy footage shifted until I saw a young seffy with flaming red hair, laughing in a greenstone garden. She lifted a child, a boy with hair as dark as Mallack’s, holding him overhead so that he squealed with delight. The camera rotated and, behind the seffy, Mallack watched, arms crossed, smiling with a kind of deep pride that touched my heart.
Without a doubt, I knew the seffy was me, even though I hadn't seen myself yet, but the red hair seemed pretty distinct. Objectively speaking, the seffy was very pretty, but that wasn't what I looked at. Her demeanor, her eyes, seemed sad, despite the smile on her lips.
I felt nothing. I remembered not a single instant of this.
The next clip showed a nighttime festival, people dancing in a plaza full of lamplight. The same seffy was there, in a silver dress, holding Mallack’s hand. He looked younger than before, barely older than the males who had escorted me out of the cave, but his eyes were already lined with that hard certainty that came with carrying too much responsibility. They danced for a moment, badly, then burst into laughter and collapsed onto a velvet bench.
I could not watch it anymore. It hurt to see myself like this and not remember.
I stared at the palmtop for a long time; the urgent hollowness in my chest was replaced by a grief I couldn't name. “I don’t remember any of this,” I finally said.
He nodded, slowly, as if that was the only answer he expected.
“Would you like to see more?”
I shook my head. “I want to rest,” I pointed at my dirty clothes, “and maybe get cleaned up.”
Mallack’s head bowed. “As you wish. I will leave you alone for a while.”
“You don’t have to.” The words tumbled from me, soft and reflexive. It was too late to take them back. But he tilted his face towards mine with a look that was all hope and no hope at all.
“Thank you,” I said, more quietly.
He showed me a closet, filled with clothes, "They were yours… I never put them away."
I didn't know what to say. How long had I been… gone?
Then Mallack pointed to the bathroom, but he hesitated to leave. He stood still, staring at me like I was an apparition; a dream come to life that he was afraid to blink and lose. And maybe it was. For him.
For me, I wished I could have blinked myself away.
Iwatched the doors close behind me and stood still, bracing my hand against the frame as if the ship’s gravity had suddenly tripled. It hadn’t. I was the one off-balance.
Daphne is alive.
I had whispered that truth to myself so many times in the last few hours, it had begun to taste like a prayer. Or a lie. But she was there. Breathing. Moving. Eyes open, lips parted in wonder, or confusion, or heartbreak.
Gods, her eyes.
They didn’t hold mine the way they used to. They didn’t soften at the edges or darken with desire or spark with mischief when she said something reckless. They were wide and watchful, like a wild creature sniffing the wind. Still the same shape. Still the same color. But no memory behind them. No weight.
I leaned my forehead against the cool corridor wall and exhaled. I’d had this ship built with her in mind. The cabin we just left had been kept untouched for twenty rotations.
I hadn't been able to bring myself to change anything or get rid of her things. Even the bed still smelled like her. Or maybe my memory was strong enough to conjure her scent: illis flowers, rain, and want. Some nights, I just lay there and stared out the window, where the stars passed like regrets.
Her body had once molded to mine like a flame to a wick. Her thighs had wrapped around my hips, her hands tugged through my hair, her teeth on my jaw. She used to kiss like it was war. Like we were fighting for breath and memory at once.
Now she looked at me like I was a stranger.
And I?—
I was hard for her. Just standing there. Godsdamned pathetic.
Twenty rotations without sex. Without a single seffy warming my bed. The others thought I was mad. I’d let them whisper. What was there to say? Daphne had been my querilly. My chosen. My only. I had no interest in anything soft, anything new. I didn’t want clever lips or willing thighs. I wantedhers.
Still did.
