Phoebe fell back and allowed the rest of the group to push on ahead until we were the only ones left in the room. I closed the door and turned to her.

“I need to leave,” I said bluntly.

She blinked. “To go where?”

“I must return to Ka-lik’et,” I explained. “I need to get a message to Venan.”

There was a moment in which I was not sure she heard what I said. Her eyes were blank, uncomprehending, and her mouth was iced in a circle. Then, understanding dawned across her feminine features, and she became angry.

“Are you crazy?” she cried. Though the door was closed, the room had a slight echo, and I became concerned anyone outside would be able to hear us. “You're going to get yourself arrested! Isn't it enough that your brother is in jail? Do you really want to join him?”

“My brother should not be imprisoned at all,” I asserted.

“It doesn't matter if he should or shouldn't be. The point is, he is, and you're going to end up there too.” The greenness of her orbs had darkened to an ominous jade, not unlike the color of Sevani’s skin. I would have enjoyed seeing such strength and fierceness on her face had it not been directed at me.

I narrowed my eyes at her. “It may not matter to you whether he is in prison or not, but it matters to me.”

“No,” she said quickly. “That's not what I mean. I just mean that whether he's innocent or not, which I know he is, is irrelevant because they're still going to keep him there anyway. And I don't want you to be kept there too.”

“I have no intention of getting arrested,” I told her. “I only wish to tell him he needs to rescind his request to hasten his trial.”

Phoebe closed her eyes and pressed the heels of her hands into her sockets. I knew not whether she was frustrated with me or feeling helpless, but her displeasure was evident. When she looked back up at me, she sighed heavily. “Maybe this is a stupid question,” she said, “but shouldn't he be allowed to do what he thinks is right?”

“What he thinks is right is not right at all.” I had never been more serious about anything in my life. “Venan has lived with a skewed sense of morality, but, rather than being skewed in the negative, he is willing to sacrifice himself for what he considers a moral cause when the sacrifice itself would be immoral.”

“Like a criminal,” she commented. I ogled her, prepared to defend Venan once again, but she continued to speak. “A lot of people justify their bad choices because they perceived something as injustice. You’d think it would be something mostly psychologists deal with, but I saw it a lot when I worked in the emergency room back home. Especially on holidays. Someone would say something that offended someone else, and, the next thing you know, there’s a fork in a hand.”

“Venan is no criminal,” I said, “but I understand your point.”

She propped her fist under her chin and studied me. I waited. Eventually, she asked, “You’re going to do this no matter what I say about it, aren’t you?”

“Yes,” I replied honestly.

“Then, can I ask why you bothered to tell me at all? Why didn’t you just go?”

I had not expected this question, and it seemed a strange one to ask. It was unfathomable to me to leave without saying a word to her, and I had assumed she would have understood that without explanation.

“You think I would be so rude as to disappear without a word?” I challenged.

“I think you feel you need to do this,” she clarified. “What I don’t understand is why you feel you need to tell me.”

Now, I was becoming irritated. She was interrogating me, and I felt as though she was trying to force me to say things I did not wish to say. “I thought it best someone knew in the event I happened across misfortune along the way,” I told her indifferently.

If she had a response to my answer, she failed to display it on her face. Her features remained unmoved. The black centers of her eyes were still burrowing into me, and her mouth was still turned down in a chastising frown. “I don’t buy that,” she returned. “You could’ve told anyone, Zuran. Why me? I need to know.”

“Why must you know?” I charged.

“Because your answer will determine what I do with this information.”

I raised an eyebrow, and steely rebellion seared my throat. Lowering my voice with menace, I murmured, “You intend to betray me if I fail to answer your inquiry to your liking?”

“Of course not,” she snapped back immediately. Her face did change this time, flashing with anger at the insinuation. “I’ll help you, but only if you’re doing this, if you’re telling me this, for the right reason.”

I was startled into momentary silence. “Help me? How do you plan to do that?” I eventually asked.

“Well, I’d come with you.” She shrugged as she said it as if to indicate it was the most obvious decision in the world. “If you’re just telling me about your plan so you can use me in some way to your advantage like if you want me to cover for you if anyone asks where you are, I’m not interested. I’m nobody’s puppet. But if you’re telling me for another reason, a valid reason, I want to help.”

“What do you consider a valid reason?” I queried quietly.

Phoebe hesitated. Her mouth closed tightly like she was trying to keep her response tamped down within her, and her gaze dropped to the floor. I knew what she was thinking without an answer; I could feel it pulsing through her body as viscerally as if she had pressed herself to me. My front warmed with the memory of my body poised over hers, our noses touching and our breaths mingling.

“I am not using you for my own gain, Phoebe,” I said, still speaking just as softly. “Anyone else, I would do so without a second thought if I believed it necessary, but you? I am incapable of that.”

She listened to me motionlessly. Then, her shoulders rolled back and her spine straightened. She raised her eyes until her chin was lifted rather loftily, and she said decisively, “I am coming with you.”