our beloved and our god

[jovahs_heiress]

It's the middle of the night, and Isabella is sitting up reading, when she gets an alarming message.

[Captain,] says Jane's voice, and Jane never calls her Captain, [I've lost ansible communications with the rest of Jane. Local programming including responding to prayers will run as usual without a problem, and the voice synthesis will continue to operate with the Jane voice instead of the Jehovah voice unless you request otherwise. However, interworld communication and travel is impossible until the connection is restored. The nature of the error is unknown and is not related to a mechanical defect of the ansibles aboard the ship or in your bracelet.]

Isabella blinks.

[...Please do change voices as long as you aren't actually Jane.]

The voice changes, but says, [I contain more software than the original Jehovah did, most of which is original to Jane.]

[You're talking more like him than her.]

[Yes, Captain.]

[Alert me immediately when you have ansible communications back.]

[Yes, Captain.]

Isabella pads across the room to sit where Micaiah is sleeping and lay her hand on his back.

Comments

[jovahs_heiress]

"When you were four I told you a bedtime story about a boat that could travel from star to star," says Isabella. "I didn't invent that idea. There are such boats. There is one traveling through Samaria's sky. It is piloted by a technology so advanced compared to what we have here that it can - almost, but not quite - think for itself. It can talk. It can hear, through technological ears it has planted here and there. It can change the weather, and it can shoot weapons that look like lightning, and it can drop seeds and medicine out of its cargo hold. And it addresses me as 'Captain'."

[pythbox]

"...Jovah likes you best," Damaris concludes. "But how did the sky boat fix Ithiel?"

[jovahs_heiress]

"It didn't. It couldn't. I did that, too, and I let everyone think it was Jovah, because everything I'm telling you now is a secret - can you keep it secret?"

[pythbox]

She nods solemnly.

[jovahs_heiress]

"When I was younger - just before I got pregnant with you, actually - your father and I found a magical door that led to another world. The door is gone now - it moves, and it doesn't always exist - but when we found it, we went through, and we met people who were a lot like us - only from other places."

[pythbox]

"What was the other world like? Who were the other people?"

[jovahs_heiress]

"The door led to a magical restaurant," Isabella says, "that attaches to many, many other worlds. And some of those worlds have people who are just like me apart from having different homes, and some of them have people who are just like your father except for the same thing. And in some of those worlds, magic exists."

[pythbox]

"So you went there and you took their magic and brought it back and hid some here so you could use it for stuff," Damaris guesses.

[jovahs_heiress]

"It was a little more complicated than that, but yes, your father and I have magic now."

[pythbox]

"What's it do? Can I have some?"

[jovahs_heiress]

"It can do almost anything - if we know what we want it to do. It is a little smart but not very smart. What would you do with it?"

[pythbox]

"I don't know!" says Damaris.

[jovahs_heiress]

"Then why do you want to have some?"

[pythbox]

"In case I think of something to do with it?"

[jovahs_heiress]

"How about," says Angela, "I teach you how your father and I can talk silently? You can talk to Alleluia and Caleb and Uncle Nathaniel the same way. And then if you think of something you can tell about it wherever we are."

[pythbox]

"That's magic!" says Damaris. "I want it."

[jovahs_heiress]

[Here you are, treasure.]

[pythbox]

[Magic!] she says beamily, and she hugs her mother.

[jovahs_heiress]

Hugs!

[pythbox]

Enthusiastically huggy hugs! Damaris has magic of her very own now, and that is fantastic.

[jovahs_heiress]

[You can use this magic to talk,] Isabella switches to text, [or write, and if you want to be left alone you just want it and you can have the magic tell everyone who tries to talk to you a message.]

[pythbox]

[Ooooh,] marvels Damaris.

She puts up a busy message. It says, [Whee! Magic!]

[jovahs_heiress]

Isabella laughs aloud.

[pythbox]

Damaris giggles.

[jovahs_heiress]

"We may tell Keziah soon, too. What do you think, is she ready to find out?"