But whether she could speak of it or not, the Keeper was still aware of her, still speaking to her, and that was such joyful news it could hardly be contained.
"So? What is it? Don't just wiggle like you have to void yourself." Edhadeya screeched at the first sound of Uss-Uss's voice. She hadn't realized the digger slave was even in the room.
"I was here in plain sight when you came in, foolish girl," said Uss-Uss. "If you hadn't been so angry at your father, you would have seen me."
"I didn't say anything," said Edhadeya.
"Oh, didn't you? Muttering under your breath about how you're not as stupid as Dudagu Dermo and you don't deserve to be shut out of everything and Mon isn't crazy because he wants to be an angel because why shouldn't worthless people like the king's daughter and the king's second son wish they could be anythingbut what they are-"
"Oh be quiet!" said Edhadeya with mock petulance. "Making fun of me like that."
"I've told you muttering isn't a good habit. Keen ears can hear."
"Yes, well, I didn't say anything about kings' daughters or kings' second sons-"
"You are losing your mind, girl. And I notice while you're talking about what you and Mon wish you were, you didn't come up with no old diggers, did you!"
"Even if I wanted to be a digger and live with my nose in the dirt," said Edhadeya nastily, "I certainly wouldn't want to be old."
"May the Mother forgive you," said Uss-Uss quickly, "and let you live to be old despite your careless words."
Edhadeya smiled at Uss-Uss's concern for her. "The Keeper isn't going to strike me dead for saying things like that."
"So far, you mean," said Uss-Uss.
"Does the Keeper ever speak to you, Uss-Uss?"
"In the thrumming of the roots of trees under the earth, she speaks to me," said Uss-Uss.
"What does she say?"
"Unfortunately, I don't speak the language of trees," said Uss-Uss. "I haven't the faintest idea. Something about how stupid young girls are, that's all I get from her."
"How odd, that the Keeper would tell the truth to me, and lie to you."
Uss-Uss cackled with delight at the repartee-and then stopped abruptly. Edhadeya turned and saw her father in the doorway.
"Father," she said. "Come in."
"Did I hear a servant calling her mistress stupid?" asked Father.
"We were joking with each other," said Edhadeya.
"It doesn't lead to anything good, to be too familiar with servants, whether they're diggers or not."
"It leads to my feeling as though I had one intelligent friend in the world," said Edhadeya. "Or perhaps that isn't good, in the eyes of the king."
"Don't be snippy, Edhadeya. I didn't make the rules, I inherited them."
"And you've done nothing to change them."
"I sent an army because of your dream."
"Sixteen men. And you sent them because Mon said it was a true dream."
"Oh, am I condemned because the Keeper gave you a witness to support your claim?"
"Father, I'll never condemn you. But Akmaro and his family have to be brought here. Don't you understand? The things that Akmaro teaches-that a man and woman are equal partners, that a family should rejoice at the birth of a daughter as much as at the birth of a son-"
"How do you know what he teaches?" asked Father.
"I saw them, didn't I?" she said defiantly. "And I'll bet the daughter's name is Luet, and the son's name is the same as the father's. Except the honorific, of course."
Motiak frowned at her, but she knew from his anger that she was right, those were the names. "Are you using the gift of the Keeper to show off?" said Father sternly. "To try to force me to do your bidding?"
"Father, why do you have to say it that way? Why can't you say, Oh, Edhadeya, how wonderful that the Keeper tells you so much! How wonderful that the Keeper is alive in you!"
"Wonderful," he said. "And difficult. Khideo is furious at having been humiliated by my letting a girl speak so boldly before him."
"Well, the poor man. Let him go back to the Elemaki then!"
"He's a genuine hero, Edhadeya, a man of great honor and not the sort of man that I want to have as my enemy!"
"He's also a bigot of the first stripe, and you know it! You're going to have to settle these people off by themselves somewhere, or there'll be trouble."
"I know that. They know it, too. There's land along the valley of the Jatvarek, after it has fallen down from the gornaya but before it enters the flatlands. No angels live there, because the jaguars and the lesser cats are too prevalent there in the rainy season. So it will suit them."
"Wherever humans go, angels can safely live," said Edhadeya. She was taunting him with his own law, but he didn't rise to the bait.
"A good king can tolerate reasonable variation among his people. It costs the sky people nothing to avoid settling among the Zenifi, as long as the Zenifi give them free and safe passage, and respect their right to trade. In a few generations. ..."
"I know," she said. "I know it's a wise choice."
"But you're in the mood to argue with me about everything."
"Because I think that none of this has anything to do with the people I saw in my dream. What about them, Father?"
"I can't send another party to search for Akmaro," said Mctiak.
"Won't, you mean."
"Won't, then. But for a good reason."
"Because a woman is asking you to."
"You're hardly a woman yet," said Motiak. "Right now the entire enterprise we just concluded is regarded as a great success. But if I send out another army, it will look as though the first attempt was a failure."
"It was a failure."
"No it wasn't," said Motiak. "Do you think you're the only one who hears the voice of the Keeper?"
Edhadeya gasped and blushed. "Oh, Father! Has the Keeper sent you a dream?"
"I have the Index of the Oversoul, Dedaya. I was consulting it for another reason, but as I held it in my hands, I heard a voice clearly speak to me. Let me bring Akmaro home, said the voice."
"Oh, Father! The Index is still alive, after all these years?"
"I don't think it's any more alive than a stone," said Motiak. "But the Keeper is alive."
"The Oversoul, you mean," said Edhadeya. "It's the Index of the Oversoul."
"I know that the ancient records make a great deal of distinction between them, but I've never understood it myself," said Motiak.
"So the Keeper will bring Chebeya and her family home to Darakemba?"
Motiak narrowed his eyes, pretending to glare at her. "Do you think I don't notice when you do that?"
"Do what?" asked Edhadeya, all wide-eyed innocence.
"Not Akmaro and his people-no, you say ‘Chebeya and her fam-ily.' "
Edhadeya shrugged.
"The way you women persist in calling the Keeper ‘she' all the time. You know that the priests are always after me to forbid women to do that, at least in front of men. I always say to them, when the ancient records no longer show us Luet, Rasa, Chveya, and Hushidh speaking of the Oversoul and the Keeper as ‘she' and ‘her,' then in that same moment I'll forbid the women to do as the ancients did. That shuts them up-though I'll bet more than a few of them have wondered how serious I am, and whether they could somehow alter the ancient records without my noticing."
"They wouldn't dare!"
"That's right, they wouldn't," said Motiak.
"You could also ask those priests to show you the anatomical chart of the Keeper that shows him to have a-"