"Inquiring minds might want to know," Keltham says, after some further contemplation, "why it is that - if you'd give Carissa to me even if she didn't want to go, because the other lives at stake in Cheliax outweighed her life - you would not also, in the event I stopped cooperating with Cheliax, decide to try to keep me here anyways.  If we hadn't made and then formalized an agreement saying otherwise, that is," and maybe, perhaps, even if they had, because somebody breaking an oath and going to Abaddon over it is maybe still worth it for them.

"You say," Keltham says, after some further contemplation and letting things sink in, "that you'd give Carissa to me even if she didn't want to go, because the other lives at stake in Cheliax outweighed her life.  Then you do not seem to feel yourself forbidden to do that sort of thing, to override the," deontology meant to be reliable without having to think about it a lot and forcing everyone else to think about it a lot, "rules and protections and guardrails around one life, when many other lives are at stake.  Then inquiring minds might want to know if you would not also, in the event I stopped cooperating with Cheliax, decide to try to keep me here anyways, with so many lives at stake.  If we hadn't made and then formalized an agreement saying otherwise, that is."

And maybe, perhaps, even if they had made that agreement, because somebody breaking an oath and going to Abaddon over it is maybe still worth it for them.

"You say," Keltham says, after some further contemplation and letting things sink in, "that you'd give Carissa to me even if she didn't want to go, because the other lives at stake in Cheliax outweighed her life.  Then you do not seem to feel yourself forbidden to do that sort of thing, to override the," deontology meant to be reliable without having to think about it a lot and forcing everyone else to think about it a lot, "rules and protections and guardrails around one life, when many other lives are at stake.  Then inquiring minds might want to know if you would not also, in the event I stopped cooperating with Cheliax, decide to try to keep me here anyways, with so many lives at stake.  If we hadn't made and then formalized an agreement saying otherwise, that is."

And perhaps even if they had made that agreement, because somebody breaking an oath and going to Abaddon over it is maybe still worth it for them.