"Let's forget them," she brightened. "I succeed pretty well. It's just—at times—that I feel low down."
"I feel low myself. Don't anyone know anything about them? Can't somebody think of something?"
Adatha Za leaned back against the marble rail of the balcony and looked at him and said, "You are big and strong. What would you do to something that was threatening you?"
"I'd fight," he grunted.
"We fight, too. But our opponent always wins. And when we fight, we always die."
Adatha Za sighed. Looking down at her, seeing the sweetly curved mouth that not quite pouted and the straight thin nostrils and deep, dark eyes fringed with long lashes, Jonathan realized she was a rarely beautiful girl. He felt suddenly as though he had been jabbed sharply under the ribs.
"Seeing you makes me want to fight something," he grinned, laughing a little. "Funny, I haven't felt like this since I was in high school. It's like the little boy who turns somersaults before the pretty little girl who's just moved next door. I guess I never noticed the little girl before."
Adatha Za looked at him, her dark eyes alight; but her thin brows raised, faintly questioning.
"Some-somersaults? What is that?"
"Oh, just a way of showing off. Putting your head down and—here, I'll show you."