Ben saw Mal at the other end of the hallway. He smiled and walked towards her. He started slowing down, when he got closer to her. But Mal didn't. In fact she just walked right past him. He turned around and looked after her, and saw that she was heading to class. But class didn't start before five minutes, so she wasn't even in a hurry. She must be mad at me, he thought.

After school, he tried to find Evie, but he couldn't find her anywhere. But doing his search, he bumped into Carlos.

"Carlos hi," Ben said, "Um... have you seen Evie?"

"No, not since this morning," Carlos answered, "Why?"

"I just need to ask her about something. Because you know, she knows everything about Mal."

Carlos smiled teasingly, "Have you messed up again, or something?"

"No! I mean... I don't know. She seems to be mad, but I don't know why. Maybe she just didn't want to talk to me."

"Yeah right. But I hope you find her."
-

At some point Ben had to go and do his work, so this Mal case, would have to wait some time.

Some time later, someone knocked on the door.

"Come in," he said.

He looked up in surprise when he saw that it was Mal. "Mal... why?... I thought... Never mind."

She didn't say anything, but just sat down in a chair beside him. "Ben?" she asked.

He looked at her, and smiled. "What?" he asked.

"Is it true?"

"Is what true?"

"That you agreed on Queen Leah's proposal to send the VK's back to the Isle," Mal said, very quietly.

"No!" Ben said, "Who the hell told you that?"

"No one," she said, and looked at him with sadness, "I heard it myself."

Ben took her hand, and she didn't pull away, she just looked at him with sadness, hate and confusion.

"I don't know how you heard that, but I swear it's not true," Ben said.

"I can't believe you're lying to me. I know what I heard. I don't know why you're doing this, but you'd better have a really good explanation. And you just dare lying."

"Mal, we're not sending you back to the isle, none of you, I won't allow that. I promise. And I don't know how you heard it, but you've got to believe me. Why the hell would I do that. Do you really think I would want to lose you?" Ben said.

Mal pulled her hand away from him. "Then explain to me what happened."

"First you have to explain to me what you heard. And you better not be messing with me, because you're really scaring me."

"I had something really important to tell you, so I was going to interrupt your meeting. Sorry. But then as I was about to open the door. I heard what you were talking about. And I clearly heard Queen Lea say, after all the trouble they caused, we can't keep them here, we will have to sent them back to the Isle. And you say, If there is no other option, we will have to sent them back. Just don't tell Mal."

"Oh that, that wasn't about that," Ben said, looking relieved, "We wasn't talking about you."

"Then what were you talking about?" Mal asked, not looking convinced at all.

"Um... I can't tell you right now, it's... I just can't tell you," Ben tried, but that didn't really change Mal's mood.

"So now you're keeping secrets from me?"

"Mal..." he tried, trying to take her hand. But she pulled it away, "I'm sorry, but you would understand."

Mal stood up, and without saying anything, she left.

"Mal!" Ben called, "Hey come back, or else I'm going after you."

Since she didn't come back, he went after her. He reached her in the hallway, and grabbed her arm, turning her around. Without saying anything, he kissed her. Surprisingly, she didn't try to pull away from him.

"Why did you do that?" Mal asked.

"Because I love you," Ben said.

Mal smiled, "You sure you wasn't just trying to make up for what happened before?"

Ben laughed, "No, sure not."

"I'm still gonna be mad at you, until you tell me what your secret is," Mal protested.

"If this is how you're mad, I'm okay with it."

Mal crossed her arms, and glared at him. "Can't you just tell me what's going on? I thought we were being honest with each other."

"I know," Ben said, "I just... can't."

"Okay," she said, "Let's just forget about it then."
-

When Ben had fallen asleep that night, Mal sneaked out of the room, and into Ben's office. She looked through some of his papers, but couldn't find anything.

She found a schedule for the last meeting, but didn't see anything suspicious on it. But then she found something attached to it. It looked like notes from the meeting. Sent goblins back. Goblins, how did goblins get here, and why didn't she know anything about it.

She was about to go back and get mad at Ben, when he entered the room.

"Mal, what are you doing?" he asked.

"Figuring out what you're hiding," she said, and showed him the note. "Goblins? How?"

Ben took a deep breath, "Okay I guess I can't keep it a secret any longer. When we had all our travels between the Isle and here, Uma wasn't the only one who found a way through the barrier..."

"Then why didn't you tell me?" Mal interrupted.

"Because I didn't want to worry you about it, and I was afraid that you would blame
yourself. So I wanted to wait until we figured out what to do. And then we decided to sent them back, which I had a hard time accepting, since I don't think anyone should live on the Isle, but there's just too many at a time, for us to handle. And I hated not telling you, I just had to make sure you wouldn't start thinking it was your responsibility. Because you would have done that."

Mal nodded, "Just never keep a secret from me again. Promise."

Ben didn't say anything.

"Ben?"

"Okay, I promise, but then you have to promise not to blame yourself," he said.

"I promise."

Mal smiled, and hugged Ben, "You're lucky I love you," she said.

"Yeah, I know I am," Ben said.
-

It didn't take long before they had the goblins back at the Isle, but Ben had been right, Mal felt kinda guilty about it, but since it all worked out well, she forgave herself.

"Ben?" she asked, next day, when they were about to go to sleep.

"What?" Ben asked.

"I'm sorry that you had to deal with the goblins, because of me."

Ben turned so he was looking at her, and held her down against the bed. "You promised not to blame yourself," he said, trying to be mad.

"I'm not," she protested, "Well kind of, but I just wanted to say sorry."

Ben smiled and kissed her, "I love you," he said.

Mal smiled, "I love you too."