[ she drops her gaze, uneasy, a sort of struggling press of her mouth that swallows something back. it's impossible not to think of aleksander, of the way he pressed her into the library desk, of the way he dragged her satisfaction out of her with an infuriating slowness that she would have never agreed to, but which left her boneless and satisfied in a way that she scarcely understood and certainly feared. ]

I don't know. [ she tugs on the braid hanging over her shoulder. ] I want you to know me well enough that the answer is to keep going. I don't want you to read my mind. I just want you to understand.