Neeva and Acorna exchanged looks.
(I thought being psychic meant that everyone would understand everyone else,) Acorna whispered to her aunt.
Neeva patted her shoulder and “whispered-vocally-in response, “Some people can hear nothing but their own inner voices shouting at them so loudly that they come to believe the shouting is coming from others. The aagroni was a zoologist before he was assigned to the terraforming project. The loss of so many of the native animals was shattering for him.”
Acorna gazed after the man who had disappeared into the throng.
“Never mind him, Khornya,” said Neeva. “The man is a relentless perfectionist. Despite his efforts, like all worlds, this world is less than perfect. Of course, Vhiliinyar was less than perfect, too, but no one remembers that now. So the aagroni does not count the lives he saved or lives of all the children born on this new world when he measures his accomplishments. He is acutely aware, however, of every single complaint about the weather, the lack of animals, the monotonous scenery, the bugs, and natural upheavals that are all too common on a recently terraformed planet.”
Just as Neeva finished speaking a breathless young person skidded up to them, almost falling in her haste to reach them.
“Your pardon, Vue()haanye Neeva,” the young person said. Her skin was a soft mocha brown and her hair a darker brown adorned with large white splotches. She was almost stammering in her haste to convey her message. “The Vilzaar Liriili wishes to see you immediately on a matter of some urgency.”
“The Vu-zaar Liriili?” Neeva asked. “When did Liriili become viizaarl”
“A ghaanye ago, Vw^haanye Neeva,” the girl said. “When Viizaar Tiilye stepped down to pursue Haarha Liirni. “
Acorna consulted the vocabulary she’d learned from the LAANYE, a translation device usually used by Linyaari emissaries to sleep-learn the languages of other species. In her case, a LAANYE had been recalibrated so that she could more rapidly learn Linyaari. A viizaar was some kind of high political office. The other term the girl used seemed to mean “higher learning.” And Acorna knew a ghaanye was roughly a year and a half in Galactic Standard time.
“We were just coming to report in,” Neeva said with extra warmth in her voice to reassure the girl, warmth that was quite at odds with the dismay Acorna felt emanating emotionally from her aunt. “I know Liriili will be so pleased to meet Khornya.”
The messenger girl looked Acorna up and down quickly, even a bit skittishly. “So you’re the one who was captured by the Khieevi,” she said. “How did you get away before getting tortured and killed?”
“Captured by the Khieevi? But I wasn’t captured by the Khieevi,” Acorna said, confused. The two of them fell in behind Neeva and Melireenya as they made their way to the road to the city. Khaari had found old friends among the greeting committee and was, judging from the exchange of lively facial expressions, deep in animated conversation with them. Thariinye, flanked by two younger female Linyaari, followed
Acorna and the messenger.
Acorna became aware of a mental exchange between her aunt and Thariinye.
(Thariinye, where do you suppose this child would get the idea that Khornya was captured by Khieevi?) Neeva asked.
(Not from me. I only said that the beings who intercepted Khornya’s pod after her parents’ death were barbaric and in some ways Khieevi-like. I never said she was captured,) the young male replied.
Acorna and the messenger girl looked at each other. Acorna was all too aware of the psychic communication that took place between the mature adults. But according to what Acorna had learned, psychic ability only began manifesting itself in the Linyaari youngsters at puberty. This girl was definitely prepubescent.
“I wasn’t kidnapped by the Khieevi,” Acorna told the young
Linyaari. “I was brought up among an alien species called humans. My adopted uncles were very kind, as were many other humans I encountered. I’m sure you would have found Mr. Li in particular most… Linyaan-like. Am I using that correctly? There were other humans who were pretty barbaric, it’s true, but my contact with the harsher aspects of humanity has been limited.”