Page 19 of Returned to the Vissigroth (The Vissigroths of Leander #6)

T he labored trotting of the nicta, the sleepless night before, and the warmth of Mallack's chest, all of it had lulled me under, and the dream took me as gently as the day’s light faded from my thoughts.

It had been days since the healer had come and gone. My mother’s arm looked better; the swelling was gone, and the angry red was already fading. She still winced when she moved, but she’d begun to hum again while she sipped broth.

The physician had recommended a mix of dried katha leaves and ground voss-root for the pain—both rare and expensive.

Mallack had said he would bring them, but I insisted I could find them myself.

I needed to get out. To prove I wasn’t helpless.

Prove that I was still something other than a shadow living in a borrowed house.

I pulled the hood up over my head and kept to the neglected side alleys with their cracked stones and weeds growing through them. The smell of fire still hung in the city, less now, thinner, but it lingered and probably would for a while.

The market was small. Half the stalls were abandoned or looted, but a few were open. Scavenged herbs lay out in tied bundles, overpriced and underweight. I found what I needed, bartered hard with a patch of fabric I’d sewn from scavenged silk, and was turning back when I heard the shouting.

The town square was a crater of ash and scorched banners, once proudly waving under Susserayn Groyk’s seal. Now the space was ringed with dragoons, watching two vissigroths face each other like a storm pounding against a stone statue.

Mallack. He was towering over another vissigroth, standing still as a mountain, but he was loud as thunder.

The other vissigroth I recognized as Kennenryn.

The male who wanted to be our new susserayn.

I had never seen him up close, but I had seen images of him on other people's palmtops when they felt generous enough to let me look.

“You dishonor every oath we swore as vissigroths,” Mallack’s voice echoed off the broken walls. “Your males pillaged homes. They took what and whoever they wanted, killing indiscriminately.”

Kennenryn sneered. “Those were not innocent citizens; they were Groyk supporters.”

Mallack stepped forward. “Do you honestly think that after your males have kicked these people out of their homes, raped their mates, sisters, and daughters, and killed their sons and brothers, they’ll just stop being Groyk supporters?”

The crowd, who had so far pretended not to listen to the spectacle, tensed. A few dragoons looked away, while one, more vocally, spat on the ground. Kennenryn's lip curled in distaste. “You speak like they’re innocent.”

“I speak like they’re people,” Mallack growled. “And I didn’t come to this war to become the monster I was fighting.”

Something in me froze. I didn’t care about politics. I never had. Whoever wore the seal, whoever called themselves susserayn, it didn’t change the price of bread or the way I had to barter for fabric scraps. People like me didn’t have sides. Just stomachs. And mothers to keep alive.

But Mallack was different. It was obvious that he cared.

He didn't have to; he was powerful enough not to. But he did. He was standing in the center of a city that hated anybody affiliated with Kennenryn, and he was speaking for us . My stomach knotted and fluttered at the same time. This male was so different from everything I had ever heard or learned about the vissigroths; he intrigued me on a new level . Zyn, he was just as brutal and ferocious as I had expected the masters of the planets to be, but he was also thoughtful and deliberate—measured in a way that made you feel the weight of every word he spoke. There was control in him, but it wasn’t cold.

It was purpose. Discipline forged from conviction.

He didn’t demand loyalty with threats. He earned it with presence. With patience. With the impossible gentleness in the way he sometimes looked at me, like I wasn’t another duty to be managed but a choice he would keep making, over and over.

And it terrified me.

Because the more I watched him, the more I wanted to understand the kind of love that didn’t need to prove itself with violence or submission. The kind that just was.

Unyielding. Steady.

Like a flame that refused to die.

And gods help me… I was starting to wonder what it would feel like to step into that fire.

This wasn’t the same man who handed me food in silence. This was something more. The more I got to know this male, the more I wanted to know. Lately, seeing him had begun to do odd things to my body. Things I was too afraid to put into words or ask my mother about.

Awakening came slowly. I didn't want it to come at all.

I knew already that the moment I opened my eyes, the moment I was fully awake, all those memories would be gone again.

I didn't want that. I wanted to keep them, hold them.

But like smoke, they were already beginning to drift, as I stirred against something warm and solid. Not something—someone.

My lashes fluttered open, and the first thing I saw was the curve of Mallack’s jaw above me, his gaze locked somewhere beyond, stern and unreadable.

My cheek rested against his bare chest, one of his arms wrapped firmly around my back, the other supporting my thighs.

It felt so good that even the loss of the memories I had had for such a short time didn't bother me. Because I was making new ones.

Until I realized we weren’t alone. People surrounded us. A handful of workers in dust-streaked uniforms, a tall Leander male I didn’t know, and a human seffy with her dark hair half-loose from a bun, smudged goggles hanging around her neck. They were all staring. Or trying very hard not to stare.

I stiffened. “Put me down,” I whispered, mortified.

Immediately, he did, with the ends of his mouth twitching. “You fell asleep,” he said softly enough for only me to hear. “I wasn’t going to leave you on the nicta.”

I swayed a little but managed to stand on my own. My limbs felt stiff from sleep, but the fresh rush of embarrassment was enough to chase the worst of the fog from my head.

“Daphne,” he said, drawing attention back to the others, “this is Claudia from the Cosmic Coalition—an advisor on the magrail—and Tovahr, the site foreman. This is my mate, Vissy Daphne.”

“Pleasure,” Claudia offered with a tight smile. Her face was flushed, her eyes bright. She was practically vibrating. “Sorry to wake you like this, but we found something. Something… well, you’ll want to see.”

Mallack gave a low grunt. “I’ll go down.”

“Ney,” I disproved quickly, surprising even myself. “I want to see it too.”

He turned to me. “You just came out of a battle. You haven’t eaten. You need to rest.”

“So do you,” I countered, my jaw set. I didn't know why I was arguing with him. I wasn't even sure where we were or where we were going, but somehow, I had a feeling I was right where I was supposed to be. That notion unsettled me.

Mallack didn’t look like my argument convinced him. But he didn’t fight me on it. “Fine,” he said at last. “But you stay close.”

Tovahr nodded and motioned for us to follow. “We rigged a lift for hauling debris. It’s stable enough for two, maybe three. The chamber is several hundred paces down.”

I walked beside Mallack, careful to keep my posture tall even as my nerves fluttered in my stomach. Whatever these people had uncovered… it was important. I could feel it vibrating in the air, humming under the soles of my boots.

Mallack helped me into the lift. It was a frightening contraption, and once the door sealed, I felt buried alive. He put his arm around me, "Easy."

"I'm fine," I told him. My heart was beating a little harder than usual, but I wasn't sure if it was from being in this… coffin, or if it was because he was so close. So close I could feel his warm breath against the back of my head.

"Are you sure?" I heard the doubt in his voice and looked up.

"Positive, why?"

"You used to be afraid of… tight spaces," under the artificial light, shadows danced over his aqua skin as his brows knitted.

"Well, I suppose amnesia has one perk then," I smirked, "I don't remember being afraid."

A low chuckle rose through his chest. The vibration was stronger even than the rattling of the cage we were locked in.

It stirred something in me, something low and molten and completely out of place, given the circumstances—I surprised myself that I didn't care about those right now.

It coiled in my belly, warm and sharp and dangerously alive.

And I was sure that it wasn't nerves because of the descent.

It was because of him. Because of the way his presence seeped into me like heat into cold metal, slow and inescapable. Of the way I leaned slightly into his side without meaning to. Of how my fingers brushed against his belt for balance, and he didn’t pull away.

He was watching me. I could feel it. Even before I looked up again, I knew those eyes were on me—dark and bottomless, etched with memories I couldn’t touch or share and a hunger I didn’t know how to answer.

Yet my body did. Gods, it did .

Subtly, I shifted in place, too aware of how close we stood in the narrow lift. Too aware of the scent of him, like woods and wind and something uniquely him . Of the way his arm wrapped around me like it had always belonged there. Like this was the most natural thing in the world.

“I don’t remember being afraid,” I whispered again, quieter now. “But I do remember this.”

He tilted his head. “This?”

“This… us ,” I said, unsure where the words came from, only that they tasted like truth. “Not like a picture or a story. It’s more like… muscle memory. Like my body knows you.”

His expression tightened, but not in pain this time. It was something heavier. He looked at me like I’d just cut the ropes holding him together.

“Your body does know me,” he said hoarsely. “And I know every inch of yours.”