Healwayssaw through me.
And if he finds out…
If he sees Nessa?—
No.
I won’t let that happen.
She’smine.
I raised her. Fed her. Bathed her through night fevers and calmed her when her claws wouldn’t retract. I held her when her first rage came — a wild shriek that shattered every light panel in the flat — and I didn’t flinch.
I made her.
And I will not lose her.
Not to the Alliance. Not to the bounty hunters still whispering about the Vakutan-human projects.
Not even tohim.
Even if it means running again. Even if it means disappearing off the grid, burning every trace of our lives behind us. Again.
Because that’s what mothers do.
And I’d rather be alone in the dark forever than watch that man’s arrival blow my daughter’s life to ash.
Back at the sink,I scrub out Nessa’s dinner dish by hand, because the sonic cycle rattles too loud and wakes her.
My hands shake.
I stare down at the foam and ceramic, at the warped reflection of my own eyes, and say it out loud — to the quiet, to the ghosts, to the void:
“If he remembers everything… I’ll lie.”
I turn off the water.
The kitchen light flickers.
Outside, the clouds shift, revealing a sliver of stars.
And I pray — not to gods, because they’ve never listened.
I pray to the memory of who I used to be.
The woman who knew how to survive.
Because tomorrow, I have to walk into that medbay again and pretend I’m not breaking.
Pretend my world didn’t come back from the dead with steel in his spine and questions in his eyes.
And gods help me…
I don’t know how many lies I have left.
CHAPTER 2
VAEL
