"I think she did a very, very good thing once," says Aelise.

"I'm not sure," says Mehitabel. "This thing might be worse. And it's going on for a longer time!"

"If everyone had died," says Aelise, "then everyone being dead would have gone on forever. I wouldn't be alive, and you wouldn't be alive, and your parents and grandparents and great-grandparents wouldn't be alive. There would be no more people in the world at all, ever. So in a way, the good thing Chelsa did is still going on too. And if she ever stops doing the bad thing, the good thing will still be going on. It'll be going on for as long as there are still people, and I mean for that to be a very long time."

"Everybody dies anyway except you and Chelsa and your very best friends," Mehitabel points out.

"I'm working on that. Anyway, it's still true that there are people, isn't it?"

"Yeah, people who get Chelsa'd all the time," says Mehitabel in an attempt at a disgruntled growl that mostly sounds kittenish from a six-year-old. "Nobody ever even asked me if that was okay! I'm just safe because I'm Gifted and if I hadn't been she would've done it to me too!"

"Would you rather," asks Aelise, "that everyone was dead?"

"Chelsa doesn't agree," says Aelise. "Chelsa thinks that everyone should get along, and she especially thinks that everyone should like her. So to get her to save the world, I had to promise that she could make everyone like her, for as long as she lived."

"But her Gift isn't being immortal. She could've died a long time ago," Mehitabel says.

"But this thing she is doing is bad."

"It is better than everyone being dead," says Aelise. "And in three hundred years, I haven't found a way to stop it that I think wouldn't lead to everyone being dead."

"That's a long time to think of something," says Mehitabel. "And you're grown up and an Empress and stuff. Were you trying?"

"Yes," she says. "It is not a simple problem. Do you think you could do better?"

"I would try very hard," says Mehitabel. "I would need to know a lot of things and think a lot, though."

"You have time," says Aelise. "Your generation is expected to live to about a hundred and sixty. Do you want to try?"

"If I think of something will you do it?"

"If you think of something that I think will work, I'll do it," she says. "If you think of something that I think will lead to everyone dying, I'll tell you why."

"Have you ever heard someone say, 'err on the side of caution'?"

"Yes," says Mehitabel. "Mommy says it when she's deciding to overcook fish. But I think that's when being very cautious doesn't mean something really really bad happens. Like if overcooked fish would make you like people you don't want to like."

"I think that everyone dying is much, much worse than Chelsa making everyone like each other. So when it comes to everyone dying, I'll err on the side of caution. I have all the time in the world to think of a way to get rid of her, but I'm only going to get one chance to try it, and if I do it wrong, everyone might die."

"Do you like her?" Mehitabel inquires.

"Why do you ask?"