"I do. I trust everything you—"

"Stop it!"

She was apparently stuck with Jason being in love. At least he was being good about it, acting fairly normally. Fairly normally for Jason, anyway. Not like the way Gari had moped around like a sick duck a few years ago when he had a crush on what's-her-name.

If she had to choose between the complaining Jason with a bad attitude that she had started out with or an in-love- with her Jason who was acting pretty nice, that shouldn't be too hard a choice to make.

So why was she feeling conflicting emotions racing through her?

"Jason," Kira began, "I'm going to be honest with you. I owe you that. I mean, you saved my life in the storm and—"

"I didn't do that to put an obligation on you," Jason said. "Go ahead and tell me to get over it."

"I can't tell you that," Kira said. "I don't how I feel about what you've just told me. I'm…confused. I suppose you couldn't help falling in love with me." She winced and covered her face with her hands. "Stars above, that sounds awful. What I meant was, I don't think you tried to fall in love with me. It just happened."

"Yeah," Jason said, staring at the grass near his feet. "I actually tried not to fall in love with you, because I…I thought you'd be upset."

"I'm not angry," Kira said. "Just confused. About my own feelings. But I do know this. We have a very important job to do. Millions of lives depend on us. We can't forget that, and we can't let personal things get in the way of our job. That has to stay our first priority, and that has to be what we think about."

"Sure. You're right. Are you sorry you kissed me on the ship?"

"No," Kira said. "I'm not sorry at all."

"Thank you. Seriously. I never thought someone would say that to me." Jason got up. "I need to, uh, do some business," he said, waving into the darkness.

While he was gone, Mage Alera came and sat on the opposite side of the fire from Kira, but farther away from the fire than Kira. For a Mage, it was a pretty bold bit of socializing. Kira inclined her head respectfully toward her. "Mage Alera, this one has questions."

Alera inclined her head toward Kira in return. "This one listens."

"Do you know anything about love?"

The female Mage took a while to reply. "I know what I feel toward Swift. And I know what Swift feels toward me."

Kira sighed. "I wish all love was that simple and uncomplicated."

"When the elders ruled the Mage Guild," Alera said, "they taught that love was an illusion."

"I tried the illusion argument with Jason already. I don't think it worked."

Jason came back into the firelight, remaining standing and looking at the grass again. "Kira?"