"I've often thought about that myself. You'll have to ask her."

"She spoke about you before we came to Zurich," I said.

"How so?" asked Samas.

"I asked her if the one that found her acted as advocate in her Ascension. She responded with a vehement 'No'. I sensed a deep animosity on her part."

"You're right about that. She's been hostile to me ever since she came back. I'm accustomed to it by now. Besides, I understand where it comes from."

"Where does it come from?" I asked, wanting him to say it.

"Well, part of it is obvious, because of what I did that last day at Latsei. But there's something else, something with edges that don't dull with time. I think she feels responsible for their deaths. If she hadn't gone in search of them they wouldn't have been exposed to the smallpox virus that was latent in both our bodies. No matter how you look at it, you cannot dispute the fact that she was responsible."

"You can't blame her for that," I said in her defense.

"No, no, no," he said shaking his head. "Don't confuse culpability with responsibility. They're different. It's not her fault, but you can't deny it wouldn't have happened the way it did had it not been for her. She was responsible. That responsibility, no matter how you justify it, is your own in the end. You can't help but carry it around with you. My only transgression is that I was witness to hers. Is there nothing in your lives for which you have felt responsible in the same way?"

His simple question cut to the very core of my being. At times it seemed as if everything I did could be reduced down to the lowest common denominator of reacting to the guilt I felt. It didn't matter that I'd inherited the guilt from unknowing benefactors. They were as real as my own. They were mine now and equated to who I was and what I thought I--what I thought we were. "Are we evil?" I asked looking at him.

"Which we? We humans, we palingenesists, or you and I specifically?"

"We Palingenesists. Are we evil for replacing and perhaps cutting short the lives of those before us?"

A look of surprise came over his face. "I've never thought of it that way. Why do you ask?"

"Samas, I've wrestled with that same kind of responsibility and guilt for a few years. I've known for some time now that I could never absolve myself of those sins, and recently, with meeting you and Poppy, it has occurred to me that there may not even be a need of absolution."

"That's right," he said emphatically. “That's the way it works. Personally, I think you're ahead of Poppy in that respect."

"What do you mean ahead of?"