As Rasa recalled it, she hadn't done very well answering that question the first time, and she wasn't about to embarrass herself by trying to answer it again now. "I interrupted your work, coming here like this," said Rasa.
"Not at all," said Issib. "Father said to explain anything you asked about."
"He knew I'd come here?"
"He said it was important that you understand our work with the Index."
"What is your work with the Index?"
"Trying to get it to tell us what we want to know instead of just what the Oversoul wants us to know."
"Are you getting anywhere?"
"Either yes or no."
"What do you mean?"
"We're finding out a lot of things, but whether that's just because the Oversoul wants us to know them or not is a moot point. Our experience is that the Index does different things for different people."
"Depending on what?"
"That's what we haven't figured out yet," said Issib. "I have days when the Index practically sings to me—it's like it lives inside my head, answering my questions before I even think of them. And then there are days when I think the Oversoul is trying to torture me, leading me on wild goose chases."
"Chasing after what?"
"The whole history of Harmony is wide open to me. I can give you the name of every person who ever came to this stream and drank from it. But I can't find out where the Oversoul is leading us, or how we're going to get to Earth, or even where the original human settlers of Harmony first landed, or where the central mind of the Oversoul is located."
"So she's keeping secrets from you," said Rasa.
"I think it can't tell us," said Issib. "I think it would like to tell, but it can't. A protective system built into it from the start, I assume, to prevent anybody from taking control of the Over-soul and using it to rule the world."
"So we have to follow it blindly, not even knowing where it's leading us?"
"That's about it," said Issib. "Just one of those times in life when things don't go your way but you still have to live with it."
Rasa looked at Issib, at the steady way he regarded her, and knew that he was reminding her that nothing the Oversoul was doing to her right now was even close to being as oppressive as Issib's life in a defective body.
I know that, foolish boy, she thought. I know perfectly well that your life is awful, and that you complain about it very little. But that was unpreventable and remains incurable. Perhaps the Oversoul's refusal to tell us what's going on is also unpreventable and incurable, in which case I'll try to bear it with at least as much patience as you. But if I can cure it, I will—and I won't let you shame me into accepting something that I may not have to accept.
"What the Oversoul can't tell us for the asking," said Rasa, "we might be able to find out on the sly."
"What do you think Zdorab and I have been working on?"
Ah. So Issib wasn't really being fatalistic about it, either. But then another thought occurred to her. "What does your father think you've been working on?"
Issib laughed. "Not that" he said.
Of course not. Volemak wouldn't want to see the Index used to subvert the Oversoul. "Ah. So the Oversoul isn't the only one that doesn't tell others what she's doing."
"And what do you tell, Lady Mother?" asked Issib.
What an interesting question. Do I tell Volemak what Issib is doing and run the risk of Volya trying to ban his son from using the Index? And yet I have never kept secrets from Volemak.
Which brought her back to the decision she had made earlier that day, to tell Volemak about what happened in the desert—about Elemak passing a sentence of death on Nafai. That could also have awful consequences. Did she have the right to cause those consequences by telling? On the other hand, did she have the right to deprive Volemak of important information?
Issib didn't wait for her answer. "You know," he said, "the Oversoul already knows what we're trying to do, and hasn't done a thing to stop us."
"Or else has done it so well you don't know she's doing it," said Rasa.
"If the Oversoul felt no need to tell Father, then is it so urgent, really, for you to do so?"
Rasa thought about that for a moment. Issib thought he was asking only about his own secret, but she was deciding about both. This was the Oversoul's expedition, after all, and if anyone knew and understood human behavior, it was the Oversoul.
She knows what happened on the desert, just as she knows what Issib and Zdorab are doing with the Index. So why not leave it up to the Oversoul to decide what to tell?
Because that's exactly what Zdorab and Issib are trying to find a way to circumvent—the Oversoul's power to make all these decisions about telling or not telling. I don't want the Oversoul deciding what I can or cannot know—and yet here I am contemplating treating my husband exactly as the Oversoul treats me. And yet the Oversoul really did know better than Rasa whether Volemak should be informed about these things.
"I really hate dilemmas like this," said Rasa.
"So?"
"So I'll decide later," she said.
"That's a decision, too," said Issib.
"I know that, my clever firstborn," said Rasa. "But that doesn't mean it's a permanent one."
"You haven't finished your bread," said Issib.
"That's because there's camel cheese in it."
"Really vile stuff, isn't it," said Issib. "And you wouldn't believe how it constipates you."
"I can't wait."
"That's why none of the rest of us ever eat it," said Issib.
Rasa glared at him. "So why is there so much in the coldbox?"
"Because we share it with the baboons. They think it's candy."
Rasa looked at her half-eaten sandwich. "I've been eating baboon food." Then she laughed. "No wonder Yobar came into the kitchen tent! He thought I was preparing a treat for him!"
"Just wait till you actually give him a piece of cheese, and he tries to mate with your leg."
"I get goose bumps just thinking about it."
"Of course, I've only seen him do it with Father and Zdorab. He might be a zhop, in which case he'll just ignore you."
Rasa laughed, but Issib's crude little joke about the baboon being a homosexual made her think. What if the Oversoul had brought someone along in their company who wasn't going to be able to perform his siring duties? And then another thought—did the Oversoul send this idea to her? Was it a warning?
She shuddered and laid her hand on the Index. Tell me now, she said silently. Is one of our company unable to take part? Will one of the wives be disappointed?
But the Index answered her not at all.
It was late afternoon and the only one who had killed any game today was Nafai, which annoyed Mebbekew beyond endurance. So Nafai was better at climbing quietly on rocks than Mebbekew was—so what? So Nafai could aim a pulse like he'd been born with it in his hands—all that proved was that Elemak should have fired the thing when he had the chance out on the desert.
Out on the desert. As if they weren't still in the desert. Though in truth this place was lush compared to some of the country they had gone through. The green of the valley where they lived was like a drink of cool water for the eyes—he had caught a glimpse of the trees from a promontory a few minutes ago, and it was delicious to his eyes, such a relief after the bleak pale gray and yellow of the rocks and sand, the grayish green of the dryplants that Elemak persisted in naming whenever he saw them, as if anybody cared that he knew every plant that grew around here by its full name. Maybe Elemak really did have cousins among the desert plants. It would hardly have been surprising to know that some distant ancestor of Elemak's had mated with a prickly gray bush somewhere along the way. Maybe I peed on a cousin of Elya's today. That would be nice—to show exactly what I think of people who love the desert.